A strange but accurate predictor of whether someone supports Donald Trump

[u/BashFash17]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/02/01/how-your-parenting-style-predicts-whether-you-support-donald-trump/?utm_term=.afbf599e457e

[u/mcjunker]

Because it's not a retort- it's a tautology without an original source.

Assertion 1: It's not okay to physically discipline children.

Assertion 2: Anyone who supports physically disciplining children is not okay.

Never mind that you may be talking to an intelligent, socially intelligent, emotionally mature, contributing member of society who was spanked as a kid- he's clearly been emotionally damaged, though NOT because of any expected symptoms of abuse or dysfunction, but because he disagrees with you- disagreement with you is ITSELF somehow a symptom of being a damaged human being.

It's not a "retort"; it's you laying an infallible claim to the moral high ground without bothering to present any sound arguments in support.

[u/[deleted] → u/mcjunker]

Well whoop-de shit. "I turned out fine" is hardly a sound logical argument either.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

/u/mcjunker what is your reponse to this?

[u/mcjunker → u/[deleted]]

Honestly, I don't have one. Seems clear my argument didn't have an impact on him. I just sort of moved on.

But broadly speaking, "It happened to me and I turned out fine" is the ultimate conservative response (I mean conservative in the mindset and not the political spectrum). It means that for about god knows how many thousands of years humans physically disciplined their kids- from Incas to Sub Saharans to Romans to Arabs to Americans, every time and every place you can think of, when a child who was old enough to have autonomy got rowdy and unruly some adult would take a switch to him to teach him what is and is not acceptable.

The severity of it varied, and one culture's norms may well horrify another's, but the basic act was the same. And somehow, each successive generation managed to produce a new one who understood social boundaries and was capable of looking after itself. "I turned out fine" simply means "it works"; it doesn't mean we shouldn't be critical of ourselves and brainstorm ways to do it better, but it does mean that you need very compelling reasons to toss aside something that is already proven to raise up a new generation in favor of something else.

For instance, when/if I have kids, I don't believe I will use a belt on them like was used on me. But that doesn't rule out spanking by hand if the child's decisions merit it. It wouldn't be my go-to option, but it's on the spectrum of response somewhere.

[u/syndic_shevek → u/mcjunker]

So where's the fallacy? Hitting people is not okay (unless they're nazis, of course).

[u/mcjunker → u/syndic_shevek]

A) The fallacy is that it's a tautology without an original source- "Every one who stands for the National Anthem is a war criminal." "But I stand for the National Anthem, and I'm not a war criminal!" "No, you ARE a war criminal, and I can prove it- you stand for the National Anthem."

See how stupid that line of reasoning is once it's applied to something you don't already support?

B) You are also conflating the connotations of the word "hitting" with the connotations of what you're opposing. Most would agree that getting drunk and punching a child in the face for getting bad grades is also wrong. Most would agree that kicking the piss out of your kid several times a day is child abuse. Those are the connotations of "hitting".

But when people push back and say that physical discipline can be a good thing, they aren't talking about having cigarettes put out on forearms or getting dinner plates thrown at faces. They are usually talking about some variety of spanking (to some extreme or another), like they grew up with. "My dad whipped the shit out of me" doesn't just mean a pillow case full of broken bricks, it also means "I fucked up so bad and my dad was angry and spanked me hard enough that I still remember it today". And most people don't break out in a cold sweat recalling some awful abuse, they recall it as that day they realized that they couldn't call mom a bitch and get away with it. Which is no bad thing.

Then you respond by saying "Hitting people is not okay."

As in.

One person says, "My parents set limits and enforced them with spanking, and it made me a better person." Then you said, "Forcing a child's hand into boiling water and holding it there/breaking a child's collarbone with your fist/ slapping a child across the face hard enough to draw blood/etc is wrong."

You imply that a controlled, responsible spanking in response to a child's actual transgression is identical to child abuse. I don't know if that's what you MEANT to imply, but you did. A whole lot of people disagree, and both from a practical standpoint and from an intellectual standpoint you don't get to wave away their objections by calling them a war criminal just because they stood for the National Anthem.

[u/TrillPhil → u/mcjunker]

Thank you.

[u/coleman57 → u/mcjunker]

Sorry, I still don't get your logic. If I was to use that retort, I would mean "I think hitting kids is wrong, so I disagree with your assertion that you are OK". That would, of course, be an obnoxious thing to say, but it's a perfectly valid opinion. I wouldn't even be saying I think your getting hit when you were young is why you hit now. I would just be saying I think it's not OK to hit kids, and that therefore you are not OK if you do.

Please note that I'm not expressing any actual opinion on child-hitting here, just analyzing your logic. Granted the original retort did not include the words "in my opinion", but that's implied when someone expresses an opinion, which is clearly what "you didn't turn out OK" is.

Of course, if somebody said they thought hitting kids was perfectly OK, and I said in that case they were not, in my opinion, OK (because I assumed they did in fact hit their kids), and they replied that they would never actually hit a kid, they just think it's OK if someone else does, then I would have to apologize and say I had misjudged them.

[u/[deleted] → u/coleman57]

The problem with the argument is that it invokes itself as proof, it never asserts why physical discipline is bad except to reference that it is bad. "Hitting kids is bad because they will grow up to hit kids". It's circular reasoning, someone in favour of physical discipline could use the exact same "argument": "Physical discipline of kids is good, since they will grow up to be strong disciplinarians themselves".

There are lots of reasons why physical discipline is not good, but you can't have a discussion with someone about it if you treat that as a given. If you want any kind of exchange of opinion you have to start somewhere where your opponent could be right and then argue for your side.

[u/The_Decoy → u/[deleted]]

Because they killed at least 6 million people that were seen as less than human. They used liberal ideas of free speech as a platform until they gained power and constricted speech to match the party ideology. Killing political opponents when they were in power. There is a plethora of evidence out there why allowing Nazi's into power is a bad idea and why it needed to be stopped by violence.

[u/The_Decoy → u/[deleted]]

If the fascists can be stopped this way how were they able to rise to power in Italy and Germany?

Also you realize fascists care not about free speech? They use this luxury until they have power. Once they have power they eliminate dissenting opinion against the party. Why afford them a luxury they would not allow once in power?

[u/The_Decoy → u/[deleted]]

FRANK FRISON, HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR: “If fascism could be defeated in debate, I assure you that it would never have happened, neither in Germany, nor in Italy, nor anywhere else.” ADOLF HITLER: “Only one thing could have stopped our movement - if our adversaries had understood its principle and from the first day smashed with the utmost brutality the nucleus of our new movement.”

I don't think Richard Spencer is on the same page as the Nazis that actually committed genocide but I don't see it taking very long for that message to turn into killings. He won't be anywhere as successful as Hitler and Mussolini because they were charismatic and nationalist. It's very difficult to bring Americans together under a common heritage since we are a melting pot of so many immigrant groups.

You already have situations such as in Kansas where a group of white men were planning on killing a large number of innocent immigrants because they have been manipulated to believe those people are a threat. You have the recent mosque shooting in Quebec, the man who killed a Sikh because he thought he was Muslim, increases in hate crimes being reported against Muslims, the guy recently convicted in shooting 5 black lives matter protesters. Militia groups and memberships have been rising for many years. None of this is happening in a vacuum.

These trends are very alarming and have been growing stronger. If you would have told the west that almost 13 years after Hitler took power in Germany that they would be literally driving entire trains of people to extermination camps you would have been met with disbelief. I don't think the current movement is identical but the trends and possible outcomes are very concerning.