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Old 6th June 2017, 08:51 AM   #161
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Originally Posted by Newtons Bit View Post
I really dislike how the right-wing media turned 'liberal' into a dirty word. Most of the people, when given the classical definition of the word, would think that is describes them and their politics...
The classical definition isn't the definition used by most liberals. Conservatives didn't do that. Liberals themselves did that, by not being classical liberals. That's why those people who are classical liberals have to append that adjective onto the term, because most liberals aren't.
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Old 6th June 2017, 08:58 AM   #162
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Originally Posted by Ziggurat View Post
What do you imagine their partisan interests are? And what evidence do you have that they only take cases which advance those partisan interests?
By "they" do you mean FIRE, or "conservatives," which is what you said in your post?

Originally Posted by Ziggurat View Post
Conservatives didn't do that.
Likewise, by "conservatives," are you including conservative-leaning media such as Fox News which very much did drive the demonisation of the word "liberal," or some amorphous definition of conservative that won't count?

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Old 6th June 2017, 09:11 AM   #163
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Originally Posted by Beelzebuddy View Post
By "they" do you mean FIRE, or "conservatives," which is what you said in your post?
Let's do FIRE, since 1) they're conservative, and 2) it's a much more tractable problem.

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Likewise, by "conservatives," are you including conservative-leaning media such as Fox News which very much did drive the demonisation of the word "liberal," or some amorphous definition of conservative that won't count?
Fox is fine for this discussion. And I don't doubt that they tried to make "liberal" a dirty word. But the thing is, they wouldn't have been able to had liberals not made their job easy. For the most part, self-described liberals don't believe in classical liberalism. That isn't the fault of conservatives, and it isn't the fault of Fox News. Fox just jumped on an opportunity that liberals created by abandoning classical liberalism. That abandonment is a far bigger problem than Fox exploiting it.
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Old 6th June 2017, 09:42 AM   #164
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Originally Posted by Ziggurat View Post
Let's do FIRE, since 1) they're conservative, and 2) it's a much more tractable problem.
Well, 1) according to the wikipedia, they aren't conservative, and 2) it's a different assertion entirely, unless FIRE is assumed to be representative of conservatives in general.

[ETA] And 3), FIRE has only been in existence since 1999. Pretty sudden to my mind.

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Fox is fine for this discussion. And I don't doubt that they tried to make "liberal" a dirty word. But the thing is,
the thing is you agree with Newton's Bit, then, that "the right-wing media turned 'liberal' into a dirty word."

Good to get that sorted out.

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Old 6th June 2017, 09:42 AM   #165
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Originally Posted by Ziggurat View Post
First off, conservatives didn't suddenly become the protectors of free speech. That's been going on for a long time now. If that commenter hasn't heard of FIRE before, they haven't been paying attention to the issue. Second, Evergreen is more extreme than most other places, but the basic dynamic is quite common among liberal activists at colleges. Third, this commenter seems more interested in harm to the image of liberals than to the actual harm done at Evergreen. That's not a good sign.
Two more articles from Alt-Right sources

Quote:
If Tumblr kids did the French Revolution, it would be exactly like Evergreen State College.

The campus erupted in protest a two weeks ago when biology professor Bret Weinstein emailed a student criticizing their plans for the “Day of Absence.” Usually the event is conducted by students of color leaving the campus for the day, but this year they wanted to coerce all white students and faculty to leave instead. Weinstein called this an act of oppression of its own, and was pilloried by hundreds of students who in effect took over the campus in Olympia, Washington.
https://heatst.com/culture-wars/rise...ve-to-the-mob/

Quote:
The bats must be put away immediately’

An official at Evergreen State College sent a memo to students Sunday asking an apparent group of campus vigilantes who have taken to patrolling the grounds armed with bats or batons to end the practice, according to an email forwarded to The College Fix.

https://www.thecollegefix.com/post/33027/
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Old 6th June 2017, 09:48 AM   #166
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FIRE is nonpartisan

Originally Posted by Ziggurat View Post
Let's do FIRE, since 1) they're conservative, and 2) it's a much more tractable problem.
Hold on a minute; FIRE is nonpartisan. However, certain past and present executives of FIRE (Harvey Silverglate and Greg Lukianoff) are clearly liberal.
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Old 6th June 2017, 10:05 AM   #167
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Originally Posted by Chris_Halkides View Post
Hold on a minute; FIRE is nonpartisan.
Nominally. Just like the ACLU is nominally nonpartisan.

But FIRE's support comes primarily from the right, just like the ACLU's support comes primarily from the left. Whenever I hear stories about FIRE's activism, it's always from conservative or libertarian sources.

Note: I don't think there's anything intrinsically wrong with being partisan.
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Old 6th June 2017, 10:29 AM   #168
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Originally Posted by Beelzebuddy View Post
...for those examples of free speech which serve their partisan interests.

The ACLU, an organization which actually HAS been a protector of free speech since its inception, butts heads with conservative policy far more than liberal.
Policy yes... but much of that policy conflict hasn't been about free speech. It has been more often about sexuality and reproductive rights.
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Old 6th June 2017, 10:30 AM   #169
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Originally Posted by Newtons Bit View Post
I really dislike how the right-wing media turned 'liberal' into a dirty word. Most of the people, when given the classical definition of the word, would think that is describes them and their politics...
I find it really humorous that for years now, conservatives have been complaining about the "left-wing media". Now, however, it's been flipped around and it's the "right-wing media".
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Old 6th June 2017, 10:39 AM   #170
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Originally Posted by Emily's Cat View Post
I find it really humorous that for years now, conservatives have been complaining about the "left-wing media". Now, however, it's been flipped around and it's the "right-wing media".
That's just shorthand for Fox News and talk radio. Nothing new there.
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Old 6th June 2017, 11:10 AM   #171
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Originally Posted by Ziggurat View Post
Nominally. Just like the ACLU is nominally nonpartisan.

But FIRE's support comes primarily from the right, just like the ACLU's support comes primarily from the left. Whenever I hear stories about FIRE's activism, it's always from conservative or libertarian sources.

Note: I don't think there's anything intrinsically wrong with being partisan.
I think this is frankly because they deal with universities and most recently, it has been mostly the left that has been causing problems. Just like in this thread and on Jerry Coyne's blog linked earlier, a lot of lefties don't want to admit weakness to their side. They don't want to "give ammo to the right".

I also think the people who talk about FIRE have been unfairly branded as right-wing.

edit: IIRC they have a list of events split by political side and it's a healthy mix of left and right but has been growing more to the left for a few years now

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Old 6th June 2017, 11:23 AM   #172
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Originally Posted by Klimax View Post
Just because somebody is not normal it doesn't mean they cannot have a point once in a while (See also "Emperor has no clothes"). And still you need to provide evidence that sentence does sound like that person.

To my knowledge I've not called anyone names. My grandmother was black and my father was Jewish so I found calling the students spoiled brats with Oppression Olympic coaches very offensive in the same way that Trump is very offensive. The argument being made at the time was that these kids, regardless of what socioeconomic class they come from, they also come from a background of PTSD or cultural trauma if they are descended from slaves. It explains the knee jerk reaction in this situation, on their part, whether or not it was appropriate.

As I said before, IMO no one should have been asked to separate themselves from others to discuss racism from the beginning. The only way this will get worked out is if people work together and see each other as just people. My personal experience of living in the PNW has been that the extreme left is no different than the extreme right, extreme being the key word here, it's just a different side of the same coin.
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Old 6th June 2017, 11:28 AM   #173
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Originally Posted by Beelzebuddy View Post
...that "the right-wing media turned 'liberal' into a dirty word."
That's no more or less true than saying that the left-wing media turned 'conservative' into a dirty word.

Honestly, I'd say that both sides are equally guilty of demonizing their opponent.
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Old 6th June 2017, 11:39 AM   #174
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Originally Posted by Emily's Cat View Post
I find it really humorous that for years now, conservatives have been complaining about the "left-wing media". Now, however, it's been flipped around and it's the "right-wing media".
I'm convinced that the only difference from issue to issue is who's doing the pointing and who they are pointing at.

The argument remains the same.
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Old 6th June 2017, 11:41 AM   #175
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Originally Posted by Jodie View Post
To my knowledge I've not called anyone names. My grandmother was black and my father was Jewish so I found calling the students spoiled brats with Oppression Olympic coaches very offensive in the same way that Trump is very offensive. The argument being made at the time was that these kids, regardless of what socioeconomic class they come from, they also come from a background of PTSD or cultural trauma if they are descended from slaves. It explains the knee jerk reaction in this situation, on their part, whether or not it was appropriate.

As I said before, IMO no one should have been asked to separate themselves from others to discuss racism from the beginning. The only way this will get worked out is if people work together and see each other as just people. My personal experience of living in the PNW has been that the extreme left is no different than the extreme right, extreme being the key word here, it's just a different side of the same coin.
Ehm, I did not say you did! As for rest of post, mostly garbage. Still blatant bloody abuse of term PTSD to make invalid point and that's just beginning of problems of post.
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Old 6th June 2017, 11:47 AM   #176
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Originally Posted by Jodie View Post
The argument being made at the time was that these kids, regardless of what socioeconomic class they come from, they also come from a background of PTSD or cultural trauma if they are descended from slaves.
An argument that you now acknowledge to be wholly bogus, right?
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Old 6th June 2017, 11:52 AM   #177
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Originally Posted by BStrong View Post
I'm convinced that the only difference from issue to issue is who's doing the pointing and who they are pointing at.

The argument remains the same.
That squares with my observations.
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Old 6th June 2017, 12:04 PM   #178
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Originally Posted by baron View Post
An argument that you now acknowledge to be wholly bogus, right?
No, there is such a thing as cultural trauma, some define it as PTSD. The trauma changes the collective consciousness of the survivors and descendants of the persecuted group.

https://books.google.com/books?hl=en...amples&f=false
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Old 6th June 2017, 12:07 PM   #179
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Originally Posted by pharphis View Post
I think this is frankly because they deal with universities and most recently, it has been mostly the left that has been causing problems. Just like in this thread and on Jerry Coyne's blog linked earlier, a lot of lefties don't want to admit weakness to their side. They don't want to "give ammo to the right".

I also think the people who talk about FIRE have been unfairly branded as right-wing.

edit: IIRC they have a list of events split by political side and it's a healthy mix of left and right but has been growing more to the left for a few years now
I could not find that list on the FIRE website (If you could point me to it I would be interested.), but one of their more recent cases involved an activist group being censored by having their provocative display on sexual harassment removed and replaced with something more 'uplifting'.

It is an interesting case:

https://www.thefire.org/university-o...s-free-speech/
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Old 6th June 2017, 12:17 PM   #180
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Oppression Olympics is precisely what is in play here. These are people at the comparative height of privilege : living in the USofA and going to University. But if you can try to claim membership in a generally marginalized class (women, minorities, non-straight, etc.) then you can dispense with measuring your own life on its specifics. You're suddenly one of the Oppressed group, irrespective of how easy or hard your individual life has been. No, it didn't happen to me or my family, but it happened to someone who looks, prays, or has sex the way I do, and so their oppression is mine. Now excuse me from class for the rest of the year, but give me a passing grade anyway.

It's comical in a sharply misanthropic way to me as an outsider on the whole situation. To someone who was genuinely oppressed, someone who actually had to deal in person with racism or sexism or what have you, I'd think it'd be downright insulting. I can't begin to imagine how a combat vet who lived with IEDs and dead/maimed comrades would feel about people like Melody "Twitter gave me PTSD!" Hensley, to say nothing of the 'generational PTSD' claptrap being bandied about in this thread as an excuse for why a gaggle of spoiled brats can't be expected not to act like a gaggle of spoiled brats.

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Old 6th June 2017, 02:16 PM   #181
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Originally Posted by Jodie View Post
No, there is such a thing as cultural trauma, some define it as PTSD. The trauma changes the collective consciousness of the survivors and descendants of the persecuted group.

https://books.google.com/books?hl=en...amples&f=false
First, anybody who describes it as PTSD is totally wrong. It is no more PTSD than it is schizophrenia or Spanish flu. Secondly, 'cultural trauma' is a vague theory of behaviour recently suggested by a tiny group of sociologists. It has no broad acceptance in any field and it has no basis whatsoever in medical literature. There is no evidence for its existence and as such it is no more credible than telekinesis or reincarnation. It is bogus and ridiculous.
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Old 6th June 2017, 02:54 PM   #182
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Originally Posted by Jodie View Post
No, there is such a thing as cultural trauma, some define it as PTSD. The trauma changes the collective consciousness of the survivors and descendants of the persecuted group.
Okay, now we're kind of venturing into woo territory with the collective consciousness bit, dontcha think?
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Old 6th June 2017, 03:01 PM   #183
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Sooooo.... Do I get to have cultural PTSD because I'm a woman? I mean, my kind has been oppressed for a huge portion of human history, so that's got to leave a lasting mark, right? Plus half my family is black, so do I get to claim their slavery-based ancestral PTSD too? Damn, my niece has the triple threat here - she's half black, jewish, and female! That's the trifecta of inherited PTSD right there!

Plus scholarships. She's totes set for college.
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Old 6th June 2017, 03:44 PM   #184
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Originally Posted by Emily's Cat View Post
Sooooo.... Do I get to have cultural PTSD because I'm a woman? I mean, my kind has been oppressed for a huge portion of human history, so that's got to leave a lasting mark, right? Plus half my family is black, so do I get to claim their slavery-based ancestral PTSD too? Damn, my niece has the triple threat here - she's half black, jewish, and female! That's the trifecta of inherited PTSD right there!

Plus scholarships. She's totes set for college.
Point of order.
Diseases are not defined by those who do not suffer from them. Neither are cultural phenomena. Both are only evidenced in the population for which they occur.
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Old 6th June 2017, 03:53 PM   #185
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Originally Posted by marplots View Post
Point of order.
Diseases are not defined by those who do not suffer from them. Neither are cultural phenomena. Both are only evidenced in the population for which they occur.
I'm not following. Also can't tell if you're being humorous.
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Old 6th June 2017, 03:54 PM   #186
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Originally Posted by marplots View Post
Point of order.
Diseases are not defined by those who do not suffer from them. Neither are cultural phenomena. Both are only evidenced in the population for which they occur.
Recovered oppression?
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Old 6th June 2017, 04:09 PM   #187
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Originally Posted by Emily's Cat View Post
I'm not following. Also can't tell if you're being humorous.
Try it this way. The fact that you do not feel oppressed has no bearing on those who do feel oppressed. The disease (cultural oppression) is defined by those who evince the symptoms, not by those who manage to avoid the illness.
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Old 6th June 2017, 04:26 PM   #188
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Old 6th June 2017, 04:35 PM   #189
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Originally Posted by marplots View Post
Try it this way. The fact that you do not feel oppressed has no bearing on those who do feel oppressed. The disease (cultural oppression) is defined by those who evince the symptoms, not by those who manage to avoid the illness.
Okay then. I feel offended, therefore you're being offensive? I am triggered, and you need to provide me a safe space?

My point, and that of several others, is that oppression isn't hereditary. Cultural PTSD because one's ancestors were enslaved is ridiculous. It also distracts from actual PTSD which is a real problem with a need for real attention.

It's one thing to discuss persistent social disparities, institutional disenfranchisement, and the embedded effects of privilege. I'm with you 100% on those.

But to characterize it as some sort of inherited disorder is harmful hyperbole that serves to distract from the problem by painting it in such an absurd fashion.
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Old 6th June 2017, 04:51 PM   #190
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Originally Posted by Emily's Cat View Post
Damn, my niece has the triple threat here - she's half black, jewish, and female!
Christ, I'm surprised the poor woman's still alive.
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Old 6th June 2017, 05:17 PM   #191
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Originally Posted by Ziggurat View Post
Nominally. Just like the ACLU is nominally nonpartisan.

But FIRE's support comes primarily from the right, just like the ACLU's support comes primarily from the left. Whenever I hear stories about FIRE's activism, it's always from conservative or libertarian sources.
Me too, but there's an obvious selection bias there--if I see an article has been linked by Hot Air and Daily Kos, which am I going to check out? Hot Air, of course.

That said, I agree with those who say that the biggest threat to individual rights on college campuses today comes from the left, and it is not going to stop, because they are getting their way. What's amusing in this case is that they are going to war not over the underlying issue, but over tactics. You get the sense that the professor is certainly sympathetic about racism--he just objected to the tactic of having all white people excluded from the campus.
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Old 6th June 2017, 05:24 PM   #192
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Originally Posted by Jodie View Post
No, there is such a thing as cultural trauma, some define it as PTSD. The trauma changes the collective consciousness of the survivors and descendants of the persecuted group.

https://books.google.com/books?hl=en...amples&f=false
Love that fourth chapter about the cultural trauma of the Holocaust. On the Germans. Looks like everybody gets to be a victim.
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Old 6th June 2017, 06:02 PM   #193
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Originally Posted by Emily's Cat View Post
Okay then. I feel offended, therefore you're being offensive?
Yes.

Quote:
I am triggered, and you need to provide me a safe space?
No, that doesn't follow.

Quote:
My point, and that of several others, is that oppression isn't hereditary. Cultural PTSD because one's ancestors were enslaved is ridiculous. It also distracts from actual PTSD which is a real problem with a need for real attention.
It's a crap name for it, but how do you think culture is transmitted from one generation to the next? We tell each other stories, stories that are very difficult to escape. If I am a Palestinian, I am quite likely to take up all the burdens of my forefathers, real and imagined.

Quote:
It's one thing to discuss persistent social disparities, institutional disenfranchisement, and the embedded effects of privilege. I'm with you 100% on those.

But to characterize it as some sort of inherited disorder is harmful hyperbole that serves to distract from the problem by painting it in such an absurd fashion.
To the extent that race is inherited, so too must ideas about what that means to those who wear the skin.
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Old 6th June 2017, 06:16 PM   #194
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Originally Posted by marplots View Post
Yes.
That's an odd definition in which any action, or inaction, can be offensive.

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It's a crap name for it, but how do you think culture is transmitted from one generation to the next? We tell each other stories, stories that are very difficult to escape. If I am a Palestinian, I am quite likely to take up all the burdens of my forefathers, real and imagined.
That culture is passed from one generation to the next is very different from the idea that trauma is passed from one generation to the next, particularly the idea that it is passed from a generation that undergoes trauma to a generation that does not undergo trauma, and even less that it is passed from that generation that didn't undergo the trauma to future generations.

For instance, in China most elderly people went through the cultural revolution. Friends of mine's parents were sent off to labour far from home (one told me her father's story of escaping and returning to Shanghai where he had to hide out for fear of being sent back). And yet that generation, in their forties now, hasn't inherited cultural trauma, and certainly the current generation of twenty somethings is living very happily without much thought about the past but instead focused on the future.



Quote:
To the extent that race is inherited, so too must ideas about what that means to those who wear the skin.
That doesn't follow. I'm not even seeing why you think it would.
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Old 6th June 2017, 06:41 PM   #195
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Originally Posted by Graham2001 View Post
I could not find that list on the FIRE website (If you could point me to it I would be interested.), but one of their more recent cases involved an activist group being censored by having their provocative display on sexual harassment removed and replaced with something more 'uplifting'.

It is an interesting case:

https://www.thefire.org/university-o...s-free-speech/
I found it. It was more specific than I thought and is a "disinvitation database"

https://www.thefire.org/resources/di...tion-database/
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Old 6th June 2017, 07:10 PM   #196
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Originally Posted by Roboramma View Post
That's an odd definition in which any action, or inaction, can be offensive.
That's because it's subjective - centered on the person experiencing the offense.

Quote:
That culture is passed from one generation to the next is very different from the idea that trauma is passed from one generation to the next, particularly the idea that it is passed from a generation that undergoes trauma to a generation that does not undergo trauma, and even less that it is passed from that generation that didn't undergo the trauma to future generations.
I agree that PTSD is an unfortunate name for the idea, but I can see the appeal.

Mostly though I'd point out that the kind of cultural damage we are talking about doesn't have a discrete beginning or end point. Further, generations don't really work that way - they are "networks" which extend across time.

Quote:
For instance, in China most elderly people went through the cultural revolution. Friends of mine's parents were sent off to labour far from home (one told me her father's story of escaping and returning to Shanghai where he had to hide out for fear of being sent back). And yet that generation, in their forties now, hasn't inherited cultural trauma, and certainly the current generation of twenty somethings is living very happily without much thought about the past but instead focused on the future.
A counter-example: There can't be that many living Holocaust survivors, yet this singular event has some serious ramifications for Jews. "Never forget." Arguably, even Jews who didn't have any stake whatsoever in the Holocaust still see it as a cultural touchstone.

I feel the need to refrain what I said above - the disease is not defined by those who don't have it, but only those who do.

This is the same for actual PTSD. "I was blown up in Afghanistan but don't have PTSD" doesn't work to challenge those who do have it.

Last edited by marplots; 6th June 2017 at 07:14 PM.
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Old 6th June 2017, 07:40 PM   #197
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Originally Posted by marplots View Post
<...>
To the extent that race is inherited, so too must ideas about what that means to those who wear the skin.

[PING] Ed Gein.
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Old 6th June 2017, 08:13 PM   #198
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For those who may have missed it, it appears that some recent scientific research involving mice and rats and (((holocaust survivors))) seem to show that not only can there be epigenetic changes due to trauma, but similar changes and/or seemingly related changes can be observed in subsequent generations, too.

That is kind of an interesting thing to think about, then. Some of these minorities could possibly have been in some ways changed from the people they might have been been otherwise due to the harsh treatment of their ancestors. ...with there being, then, actual chemical changes that can have an effect on their emotional states and maybe personalities on top of whatever the cultural changes in attitudes there might be, also.

"Fearful memories haunt mouse descendants"

http://www.nature.com/news/fearful-m...ndants-1.14272

"Can trauma be passed to next generation through DNA?"

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/extra/da...n-through-dna/

"Hereditary trauma: Inheritance of traumas and how they may be mediated"

https://www.sciencedaily.com/release...0413135953.htm

"Epigenetic transmission of Holocaust trauma: can nightmares be inherited?"

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24029109

Last edited by Shepherd; 6th June 2017 at 08:23 PM.
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Old 6th June 2017, 08:22 PM   #199
marplots
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Originally Posted by Shepherd View Post
(some snipped)

For those who may have missed it, it appears that some recent scientific research involving mice and rats and (((holocaust survivors))) seem to show that not only can there be epigenetic changes due to trauma, but similar changes and/or seemingly related changes can be observed in subsequent generations, too.
I was going to bring that up but I don't believe the evidence is very impressive.
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Old 6th June 2017, 08:32 PM   #200
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I'm just a reporter! ...lol
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