Thanks, that was my mistake when I joined this site, thinking you guys were respectable enough to not cheer at the death of someone you disagreed with.
I mean, kind of ironic on a debate site to be someone mocking a debater for being killed. That's like...half the site FLRW would cheer the killing of. And then who would be left for him to argue with? Much as I have disagreements with both Charlie and the people mocking him, it's all free speech. Killing over it is stupid.
The argument is that with a pedophile turning in his accomplices, the good action is stained with his responsibility for what happened. With FDR, fighting Hitler didn't require the camps, it was a separate event. So it's easy to brush aside.
If a living Jeffery Epstein releases the names of 20 sexual predators to get a lesser sentence, then we wouldn't approve of Jeffery Epstein as a whole because he had his own skeletons.
That's not because he has skeletons, but specifically he helped the same people who he's now fighting against, so you could argue he's basically responsible for the problem he's solving. So, more akin to Stalin fighting against Hitler after the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact.
his idea of reasonable precautions was having armed guards.
That is in no way, a reasonable means of preventing unnecessary deaths.
A lot of unnecessary deaths have been prevented by armed guards. That's why the Secret Service exists.
FDR didn't get involved in WWII to end the Holocaust; he got involved because of the Pearl Harbor attacks
But he did get involved, and he did fight Hitler, and people care more about policies more than the reasons behind them. Also, lend-lease was before Pearl Harbor.
FDR did the same to the Japanese
But he also fought Hitler, whose camps were significantly worse.
The point isn't just the people getting shot, it's the political fallout of killing a notable political figure just to enrage people. The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand caused a chain reaction leading to two world wars. If any assassination in recent memory had a chance of being "good," it was probably the one everyone was glorifying, right? Except the fact that everyone glorified it likely led to another assassination that looks like it will cause significant political fallout.
After Charlie Kirk's assassination, Republicans are seething with rage now at the left, and they have a lot of sympathy from centrists. Most people on the left recognize that, even if they didn't love Charlie Kirk, his death doesn't put the left in a good situation politically. Like it or not, people are emotional creatures, and assassinations tend to elicit pretty strong reactions, whether or not it results in terrible policies. This is bad news for Democrats regardless of whether the shooter was on the left or not, and it's also just bad news for everyone to have the most powerful people in the country seething with rage.
Some reports are coming out now that there was writing on the bullet casings used for the assassination, reminiscent of another high-profile killing in recent memory. If this news is true (and even if it's not), it's very plausible that this assassin saw all the praise Luigi Mangione got and decided to do an assassination himself. Back when Luigi (allegedly) killed Thompson and was widely celebrated for it, I recall being one of the few people saying that glorifying political violence would set a dangerous precedent, and that breaking the state monopoly on violence without a solid plan to replace or reform the state would be more likely to have bad long-term consequences than good ones. Back then, far fewer people seemed worried enough to ask "what comes next?"
So, what came next? We can consider this assassination, and the inevitably destructive political fallout that follows, the answer to that question. This probably isn't the only violent action inspired by the glorification of Luigi, though the link here seems more clear. Fortunately, it seems that a lot of people have seen where this trend is headed, and cooler heads may soon prevail. But the snowball has started rolling, and this realization may be too late to avoid much of the damage that follows.
At some level we have to take reasonable precautions to prevent unnecessary deaths.
Which Charlie agreed with, but his idea of reasonable precautions was having armed guards.
And if you don’t believe that there’s not much you can really say when you become the victim.
The victim is dead, so yeah, not much they can say.
I'm talking about the left and right in extremely broad terms. Obviously a political leader should have more accountability than randos on Twitter, but then again, there are a lot more randos on Twitter than elected officials. And who elected Trump? A bunch of randos.
But I digress. My point is just that both sides "burn through goodwill," and regardless of whether social media comments should harm the public perception of the Democratic party, I think that it does. That's why I'm saying goodwill is basically being "spent" for nothing, they've barely done anything to advance their goals. If the Democrats on social media just chilled a bit, it would give a lot more leeway to Democratic politicians to pass more aggressive policies. It's probably because social media skews young that more insane people on the left have a platform to make themselves look bad. Crazies exist on the right, but they're mostly too old to understand how technology works.
Non of these refute my main point, especially as we get to military grade weapons which is where most gun control advocates like myself feel far more strongly about the lack of regulations.
The point about military grade weapons is probably fair, but it's not really what Kirk was defending in the quote he gets criticized for. ("Military grade" can be a misleading term anyway, I've seen cases of people in the military joking that they assume a product is low quality when it's advertised as military grade). I don't think Kirk was arguing for zero limits on any weapons ever (extreme example would be a tank or something). He was killed with a bolt-action rifle, so even if he was wrong about military grade weapons, his death doesn't really establish that.
Republicans are basically saying “yeah they’re dangerous, but we should do nothing to minimize the harm, and if people die so be it”.
I don't think that's really fair...the Republican view is more long the lines of gun control exacerbating other harms outweighing the harms from shootings. For example, someone who would have gotten a gun illegally anyway attacks you and you can't defend yourself. Or the government has an easier time establishing tyranny because citizens aren't armed. I understand that gun control is aimed at getting the best of both worlds, but Kirk would probably say it makes self-defense or fighting the government significantly harder to the extent that the harms outweigh the benefits.
The quote that I'm referring to that keeps getting brought up is him saying that the 2nd Amendment is worth the risks, which is specifically him arguing against a total gun ban. He argued against gun control too, and your points there are valid, I just think it's weird for people to use that quote against him if they aren't prepared to actually oppose the 2nd amendment. I think you and I aren't really in disagreement here, my initial post was just about some people's criticisms of him for arguing what was actually a somewhat reasonable position (though he's gone further against gun control in other cases than I would like).
This is what comes next. I don’t know just how much this will energize them, but this is the play.
Yep. Usually when one side does something that makes themselves look bad, the other side jumps on the opportunity to burn through goodwill. The "left" behaved badly by mocking a dude, so now the "right" has a pass to behave badly without looking worse than the left. Taking the high road strategically could be a better strategy long term, but that requires patience, and nobody wants to be the one taking the "high road" if it feels like the other side might be getting away with bad behavior in the short term. Both sides burn through goodwill in different ways but usually for things that aren't even worth it, like a counterproductive policy, or mocking people online. This is equilibrium, and it doesn't look like it will be changing any time soon.
Also, he's been criticized for being pro-life and yet dying (by the same groups), so it's basically a Kafka trap, even though both of these things are being said in jest. Apparently being shot after saying anything positive about "life" is ironic and somehow worthy of mockery, but it's also ironic to die after supporting a policy that could potentially result in death. Basically two polar opposite reasons people have used as criticisms against him. There's basically no position he could have taken that would avoid mockery along these lines or not be portrayed as somehow ironic.
Your analogy fails because cars are a necessity for us to function in a developed society. Guns meanwhile have no other purpose other than to kill people, that’s literally what they’re designed to do.
They can be used for hunting, as a deterrent, for self-defense, or as insurance if the government goes to heck (two of those involve killing people, but neither really apply to killing Kirk). I know some would say the government has already gone fascist, but killing Kirk doesn't accomplish any of the things he'd likely advocate their use for.
you need a licence to drive because a car could be dangerous if it's in the wrong hands
Sure, but the point is that supporting a thing being allowed doesn't mean you being killed by that thing somehow proves you wrong. If I think speed limits should be above 10km/hr, and I get hit by a car going faster than that, that's bad luck but doesn't really harm my position. It's not like Kirk said there should be on limits on people owning weapons (like nukes or something), he just supported much broader limits than the average person.
I'm not even saying his views about guns were right, just that his views were pretty consistent with not wanting to be shot.
While I think he was wrong about guns (honestly an issue I could stand to study more), I think it's silly that his views on gun ownership have been used to mock him. If someone says "driving cars should be legal even if they sometimes kill people" and then someone intentionally runs them over with a car, I don't see how that somehow proves the person wrong, or is even that relevant. It's a single data point, it's not enough to run a cost-benefit policy analysis. His quotes about shootings were said in the context of a gun control debate, people saying it now are just using it to mock him, which doesn't make sense because he never said shooting someone for giving their opinion is a good thing.
Democrats trying to legalize gay marriage for example you don't really care that much about if you're straight (unless you have a very big heart which most people don't have). Trump wasn't an option in 2005.
So they can fight on abortion or immigration or student loans or crime or guns or any of the other 10 issues Americans care about more than climate change, none of which require a global conspiracy.
https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2024/05/23/top-problems-facing-the-u-s/
In Denmark, emissions have gone down. In Sweden, they went down. In Chile, they went up, but up is the general trend with increasing demand, if it was just about Dems winning elections, Chile wouldn't be investing to stop it at all.
Because politics is a show. You need young people to feel like they are "fighting the good fight" (whether it's climate change, LGBT stuff, or Trump) so they give money voluntarily to the parties.
So they have all those other issues to fight over. No need for a global conspiracy involving scientists in every country to help Dems win elections.
How much did China reduce their carbon emissions by to help fight against climate change? None because they don't think it's a big problem.
I didn't say every country takes steps against climate change, just that the US isn't the only country concerned with it. Denmark, Sweden, and Chile, for example, have worked on reducing emissions.
The democrats and republicans co-manage elections; they make sure nobody else is allowed to run.
If they're working together, why do they need to take opposite stances on a made up hoax in order to win votes? Convincing a bunch of other countries with their own scientists that climate change is an important issue seems like overkill if they control all elections anyway.
Do you disbelieve that global temperatures are rising at all, or do you just think the threat is exaggerated?
Also, the US is not the only country where people believe that climate change is real. Plenty of other countries are taking steps against it. If the Democrats were capable of a conspiracy that big, you'd think they'd win elections more often.
Fixed
Which account are they on? Not seeing those under "SomeDebatePerson"
Which debates are you seeing that should be deleted?
Where are you seeing them? On your profile?
Sure, but I'm talking year round. Since heat capacity is a scalar effect, as long as the net movement is an increase, then the net effect will be greater on land. Even if the decreases are greater on land, there are more increases than decreases. Like 2*(2-1+2-1) > (2+1+2-1)
No, average temperatures include both rising and falling temperatures, not just rising temperatures. Otherwise, sea would be significantly colder than the land on average.
Yes, but right now we're in a period of warming. If we were in a period of cooling it would be the other way around. If you and I are racing and I run faster than you, then if we're both running to the right then I will be going to the right faster. Over millions of years if we run back and forth, then sure I won't always be to the right of you. But we're talking about an overall warming trend.
Not if the overall effect is a rise...if the temperature is rising overall, it's gonna rise faster on land.
So we're just ignoring heat capacity here?
That proves my point. Sea temperatures in past 20 years rose by 0.4 degrees only, while meassuring stations on land reported a rise in temperature of 1.5 degrees on land. Thats a significant difference between rise in temperature on sea and temperature on land.
But it's still a rise. Also, given how heat capacity works, we should expect that land will heat up faster than the sea. So even if all we had was sea measurements, we could be estimating a significant warming effect. Even then, the most important measurements are directly looking at the effect on the poles, and that just requires accurate sea measurements.
Life is not really fair.
Okay, but we're trying to come up with the fairest system. Why would we not? This is also relevant with regards to enforcement. You're comparing it to laws against murder, but it's more like designing the fairest rules for a sport. Consistently enforced rules for everyone matters more than what the exact rules are.
This is irrelevant unless you think that getting help from other humans to write your debates should be allowed if not actively encouraged.
There's a difference between "help writing" and "feedback." Getting feedback from other humans is fine so long as you are not plagiarizing and they are not writing the arguments for you (for example, a voter saying why an argument is strong or weak). Are people not allowed to just...test the argument elsewhere and see what counterarguments come up? That's basically getting feedback.
(1) getting help from another human is, generally speaking, wrong
Well then this is the premise I dispute. Feedback (and even borrowing ideas) isn't wrong or plagiarism. Having someone else write part of your argument for you is plagiarism.
I think a lot of being a "great" leader is being a decent leader in the right place at the right time. And I think Lincoln was pretty decent. With the benefit of hindsight, being against slavery was obviously the right call and the war was winnable for the North, but at the time it was a bold move to be strongly against slavery and be willing to listen to someone like Douglass. Plus, he had to convince the North that the war was winnable while also taking measures to prevent another civil war. If you look at the presidents before and after, Lincoln's competence stands out. It can be really hard not to make huge mistakes, so a lot of what make a good leader "good" is the bad things that could have happened under another leader but didn't happen under them. But you don't see that directly.
Why do people view Lincoln as so magnificent? Is there something I'm missing?
Well, which presidents do you think are better? Because a lot of the things that might make Lincoln overrated apply to other "great" presidents too. It's all relative.
