Facebook's "new" 58 genders

[Kramodlog]

Note that your quote is selective in that it deliberately avoids where I say explicitly that slavery is not good. Lifting things out of context is a fairly obvious tactic when trying to discredit someone.

To address your point about me not bringing up equality, I didn't think there was much need. You seem to be continually thinking that I am against various things that I have raised but I do not see why you think this. Look at these things critically and fairly and you'll see that, like everything else, equality is both good and bad. It's good when it raises standards for you... and bad when it lowers standards for you.

People today need to engage their critical thinking a lot more and I'm not directing this at you but as a generalisation. Too much of anything can be bad. So for example equality, while largely a good thing, can lead to positive discrimination, which is bad if you are on the receiving end of this. For example, if you didn't get a job because of a need for a company to hire a certain percentage of its employees using some form of arbitary criterial. Politicians might try to implement such a thing to reduce unemployment in the over 50s at the expense of someone who would do the job better. So it depends on how far it goes, equality.

Ok, so about the subject at hand: gender equality, gender representation, gender classification?

In all things balance is key and this is what I would like the take away message to be. Modern life is fairly unbalanced in many ways (greed, self interested politicians, media not interested in the truth, a disinterested and largely ignorant public, a lack of concern for the environment, a love of money...).

How is this different from the past? Politicians are self-interested? Nothing new. People are ignorant? People in Western countries are more smart, educated and informed than they ever were in history. How can they be ignorant? Think people are more disinterested than before? Well in one of his plays (can't remember which one), Sophocles critiqued the lack of participation of citizens of Athens in their democracy. Media are not interested in the truth? What is the truth? Subjectivity plays a big part in what the "truth" is. People love money? Are you familiar with the story of king Midas and his golden touched? Granted this myth is interpreted through our eyes, but it seems like and old critique of greed.

Old fashioned values like love, truth, honesty, justice and honour are lacking.

I disagree. This sentiment comes mostly from idealizing a past that never was.

 

[kingius]

We'll just have to agree to disagree on these aspects. Socrates was berating the youth of the day and not his society, thereby proving that some things are the same in any age.

Did you know that in feudal times the men of the village would ride out to meet approaching strangers? It was both a show of strength and a way to welcome strangers into the midst.

Did you know that during the recent riots in the UK, the Sikhs took to the streets (about 500 of them) to patrol their neighbourhood, which bordered the street where the rioting occured? They did this to stop it spilling over to their homes.

These are just two examples of the community spirit which we in the west have completely and utterly lost. Our big cities are full of strangers, our checkout staff operate like (and are in danger of being replaced by) machines, people confine themselves to purely digital lives (there are some who have even died playing World of Warcraft). To bury one's head in the sand about the transformation ... reduction... of the human race that is on going is to ignore what we have come from and the very things that make us human. For to know oneself one must also know the past and only then can one understand the present, never mind the future.

A steady diet of reality TV, a fantasy world of advertisments, constant lies from the media and politicians regularly robbing the public purse, all combined and all at once is a new phenonema. Never before in human history have we lived in times like these. Look around. Loyalty, justice, honour, love, harmony with the environment, morals and ethics... these are the real qualities of an advanced civilisation. We are not measuring up, you know this to be true, if you look inward to your heart and outward to the world around. Instead we're collectively obsessing about what sex someone is, what the latest celebrity is doing or wearing today, watching daft videos on youtube and scrambling to get ahead in a meaningless rat race or pretending to gun people down in computer games and trolling our fellow man online. Our ancestors would not be proud.

 

[Umbran]

These are just two examples of the community spirit which we in the west have completely and utterly lost.

I am not sure that's at all accurate. However, as a Bostonian, the strongest example I can think of from recent events is not really admissible, as discussion of it would most assuredly drift into the political.

Simply put - I've seen communities pull together, when it is called for.

This is not to say that some of the cultural shifts you mention are not troubling. But the absolute statement... isn't so absolute.

 

[Zombie_Babies]

Additionally, the world was hardly full of love, truth, honesty and justice 'back in the day'. Men were allowed to beat their wives and kids, women couldn't vote, robber barons got rich dishonestly - hell, even our beloved Thomas Alva Edison wasn't beyond fabricating lies about his enemies. The infrastructure responsible for the industrial revolution was built upon the backs of what were basically slaves, America was at one point nearly entirely composed of drug addicts. Pot was banned thanks to 'refer madnes' - an ad campaign that painted an entire group of people as murderous, rampaging rapists. These same people had to ride at the back of the bus, drink from different water fountains and were sometimes subjected to vigilante justice. I mean, I could go on and on. What goldo says about idolizing a past that never was is true. The past was bad - at least as bad as the present.

 

[Kramodlog]

We'll just have to agree to disagree on these aspects. Socrates was berating the youth of the day and not his society, thereby proving that some things are the same in any age.

Umm, yeah that is not the general concensus about Socrates.

Did you know that in feudal times the men of the village would ride out to meet approaching strangers? It was both a show of strength and a way to welcome strangers into the midst.

Did you know that during the recent riots in the UK, the Sikhs took to the streets (about 500 of them) to patrol their neighbourhood, which bordered the street where the rioting occured? They did this to stop it spilling over to their homes.

These are just two examples of the community spirit which we in the west have completely and utterly lost. Our big cities are full of strangers, our checkout staff operate like (and are in danger of being replaced by) machines,

And cities offer freedom and opportunities. In small rural communities pressure to conform to arbitrary models is very strong. In a city you can escape such pressures, be yourself and find people who are like minded. Cities also have a variety of cultural offers. I'm not just talking theatre and museums, but people of different ethnicities.

people confine themselves to purely digital lives (there are some who have even died playing World of Warcraft).

Yeah, new tech gets critiqued, that is a constant, but you can also see it as a way for people to communicate and weave new ties, in other words, form new communities that are not strickly limited by proximity.

To bury one's head in the sand about the transformation ... reduction... of the human race that is on going is to ignore what we have come from and the very things that make us human.

I'm not denying society is transforming, all I'm asking, again, is why that is bad? Human make the changes happen, we cannot make inhuman changes to society. We invent communications tools like phones and the interwebz cause we are an animal that likes to communicate a lot. What we can do is deny our nature, like say repress our sexuality, but that is in another thread. But than repressing some of our nature seems natural to us. Go figure.

I do not see how that isn't with our nature. For to know oneself one must also know the past and only then can one understand the present, never mind the future.

I agree, I just have a very critical view of humanity's past. Which period do you think was better?

A steady diet of reality TV, a fantasy world of advertisments, constant lies from the media and politicians regularly robbing the public purse, all combined and all at once is a new phenonema. Never before in human history have we lived in times like these. Look around.

I do. I'm still waiting to get example of how things are different from the past. Reality TV? People use to tell stories around fires. What lies from media? What objective standards do you use to mesure "truth"? Again, how are today's politicians so different from politicians of old?

Loyalty, justice, honour, love, harmony with the environment, morals and ethics... these are the real qualities of an advanced civilisation.

Is it? Who said that? We do not have those? How come?

Honour is very ridiculus. Dads kill their daughters because of it, men use to disembowel themselves cause of it. Not sure I want a lot of honour in life.

We are not measuring up,

Compared to what? I'm really curious.

you know this to be true,

Clearly not.

if you look inward to your heart and outward to the world around.

I think, in the post-war period of Western societies, humanity has never had it so good.

Instead we're collectively obsessing about what sex someone is,

Collectively? Really? I thought most people didn't care cause it really didn't affect them and this is why a minority of people had to fight to get some recognition... on Facebook.

what the latest celebrity is doing or wearing today, watching daft videos on youtube and scrambling

Stories and the medium have change, but the behavior is the same. Maybe a critique of mass consummerism is more appropriate.

to get ahead in a meaningless rat race

Life is meaningless, but we still need to work to feed ourselves cause living is sort of a reflexe for most of us. Nothing much has changed.

or pretending to gun people down in computer games and trolling our fellow man online.

Better to pretend than actually do it. Maybe this serves as a catharsis for our violent impulses.

Reminds me of Iceland and its recet band on internet porn. I wonder if it will have an impact, positive or negative, on sexual assaults and such.

Our ancestors would not be proud.

It is easy to put words in the mouth of the dead. Which ancestors are you talking about anyway?

 

[kingius]

As I say, we'll just have to agree to disagree. If this were D&D we'd be different alignments. You are anti-honour in your prose. Loyalty to the coin is often no loyalty at all (see mercenaries switching sides mid battles in history for examples of this). You see humanity losing its heart and becoming more like machines as being a good thing too. On aspects like these I can never agree. I would like to see a society where truth, honesty, love and loyalty are held high, where the environment is respected and not polluted, where rivers can be drank from and water is not held hostage by water companies whom we must pay to drink safely, where people can be themselves without being ridiculed throughout the world on youtube or via reality TV, where our rulers are in it for righting wrongs and not for fleecing the public, where the media has high standards to verify the truth of what are being reported and so on. Essentially, a good world... and not merely for mankind to live in, but for all life that we share this world with. That (in my opinion) should be our ultimate goal, not turning more people into potential customers and not spying upon everyone as though they are criminals by a distrusting and megalamaniac and greedy elite who wish to keep the public as distracted (and ignorant) as possible. We live in very dark times, but the wool has been pulled over our collective eyes, just ask the endangered species list if you don't believe me, which you won't.

 

[Kramodlog]

You see humanity losing its heart and becoming more like machines as being a good thing too.

No, I'm actually saying humans are staying human.

I would like to see a society where truth, honesty, love and loyalty are held high, where the environment is respected and not polluted, where rivers can be drank from and water is not held hostage by water companies whom we must pay to drink safely, where people can be themselves without being ridiculed throughout the world on youtube or via reality TV, where our rulers are in it for righting wrongs and not for fleecing the public, where the media has high standards to verify the truth of what are being reported and so on. Essentially, a good world... and not merely for mankind to live in, but for all life that we share this world with. That (in my opinion) should be our ultimate goal, not turning more people into potential customers and not spying upon everyone as though they are criminals by a distrusting and megalamaniac and greedy elite who wish to keep the public as distracted (and ignorant) as possible. We live in very dark times, but the wool has been pulled over our collective eyes, just ask the endangered species list if you don't believe me, which you won't.

Have you considered anarcho-syndicalism? It promises a great utopia.