This question is social/political, and meant to trigger a nice debate on the negatives of imbalanced infinite progressivism we seem to be heading in social and technological spheres, ignoring science, practicality and reason.
Let me put up a disclaimer that I am not trying to poke transgender community here. I am trying to hint towards the “traditional” gender roles that seem to be frowned upon in a cultist manner, even though it is accepted in an unspoken manner that most of us do prefer a lot of “traditional” aspects once we surpass 30s, and life demands responsibility, accountability and maturity.
8values made me think of the fundamental parameters that we gauge ourselves and others on, and this seems like it would have opinions coming from leftists that frown upon traditional values in an almost religious manner, as well as centrists and conservatives that might not have as traditional views as leftists think. Just an open discussion.
We can replace “progressivism” with “liberty” and “nationalism” and create couple more questions, but those are not as debatable I think.
Classic example of JAQing off.
The fact that you pretend to not poke specific groups and still use derogatory language („cult like“) shows that you are not sincere.
If you were interested in a respectful debate, you would start out respectful:
- What is the reason that people find x necessary?
- How do you think y should be handled?
- Who do you think should bear responsibility for z?
Feel free to rephrase your post to reflect that you actually mean to discuss this respectfully instead of pushing right wing ideas.
Thanks
There are no rightwing ideas. This is called open discussion. Nobody is pushing Nazism or pedophilia here so everything else should be open and acceptable for discussion.
Did you read the comment you replied to or did you just spit out this pre-packaed reply that addresses nothing the original comment raised?
If they are calling me “not sincere” and “JAQing off” and pushing rightwing ideas allegedly, this is all I can say. They gave a prepackaged reply.
JAQing off is a documented concept. If you understand it, you know what I‘m accusing you of and if you were sincere, you would ask yourself if that ist the case and answer based on your conclusion instead of flat out denying it without any counterexample. Also, I cited why your way of asking was derogatory, you didnt rebuff that.
From your repeated doubling down, I can only conclude that you‘re a troll. Feel free to prove otherwise. If not you get blocked and thats it.
My goal was to not do this exercise for the sake of it, or to push some BS you seem to think I do, but to gain a consensus or discuss ideas on what exactly is “traditional”, because not everything “traditional” is evil. But seeing everything old as bad seems to be a wrong fad. Defining these ideas and words as society and time progresses is critical to continue getting answers to questions that allow bringing change in society. Our society is metaphorically moving at the speed of light right now, especially with the collapse of rightwing diaspora and us being in late stage capitalism and the fall of Western superimperialist hegemonic order.
Although we‘re moving away from the „thats not the case“ stance of yours, we‘re still not at „yes, pushing ideas by framing the question a certain way isn’t how a healthy discussion works“.
This is a rhetorical issue. Your point might be valid but „not everything traditional is evil“ and „cultlike“ are both terrible ways of communicating it.
Another example of this would be saying „the cultlike thinking that everything needs to stay the way it is“ or „not everything progressive is evil“. Those are not ways to discuss this.
The first one is manipulative same as asking „How stupid do you think you are?“ The second one is a strawman as it implies people would really think that everything traditional is bad. You most definitely know thats not the case. This is often used to make „arguments“ which they really arent.
Examples for a healthy (because neutral) approach:
- How can we mend the divide between healthy progression and keeping what is already good?
- How do we identify when progression for the sake of progression is wrong, same as keeping tradition for traditions sake?
The reason I bother to discuss this with you is because I think party politics is a way to divide and conquer the population so they can be exploited further. I‘d like to see that change but the first step must be to talk to each other in a more respectful, less manipulative way.
Have a good one.
Your point might be valid but „not everything traditional is evil“ and „cultlike“ are both terrible ways of communicating it.
I had trouble communicating it because I did not know how to frame it. It is not like I have seen this being asked anywhere either, so I thought it would make for an interesting Asklemmy.
How do we identify when progression for the sake of progression is wrong, same as keeping tradition for traditions sake?
I can see it being offensive too, for those who want questions to not challenge their worldviews at all. There is no easy way around it, even if I could word it better.
There is no intent of manipulating people, if you checked my history, or checked that I have had an account on Lemmygrad instance for a good while. Socialists are not very forgiving of grifters, if I happened to be one.
They’re opposite. One is about everyone trying to get larger pieces of pie. The pie is only so big though, so it means people miss out, and it only ends when one person has the entire pie to themselves.
“Progressivism” is about ensuring everyone gets as close to the same amount of pie as possible. Once everyone has equal access to the pie, there’s nothing more be done.
It should be pretty clear why one is more sustainable than the other
Is equal portion of the pie not an economic prospect, rather than a societal one? Is progressivism not about social change using rational consensus?
The pie is everything. Economic equality, social equality, it’s all in scope
Progressivism is a process for the outcome, whereas economic equality is the ultimate outcome as far as resource (and role) distribution goes. I could be wrong but to me it looks like that, since its all about the class war, and to end class war, capital distribution seems to become the defining target for all things.
I was trying to look at it from a different lens, one where progressive people tend to irrationally see anything “traditional” as bad. How do we define it? It is a thought poking my head for a while, and is what makes me try and pursue my own path on the leftist spectrum, distancing myself even from capitalists disguised as socdems.
Something isn’t bad if people have genuine consent as to whether they participate in it.
The very idea of something being traditional though exists precisely to pressure people in to certain ways of doing things. Ways that work for some, but not others.
Get rid of the pressure, let everyone choose for themselves, and we’re all good
Alternative perspective: many “traditional” things are in fact bad. Not everything, but many things, and we should dump those things.
Many are bad, but many are good too. It is all about objectively looking at things, and considering if they are dissociated from the “traditions” we consider bad. This post was made to encourage that.
Tradition effectively holds no weight with me. Is the idea worthwhile? Then why does it matter what people did in the past about it? Is it bad? Then why would I do it?
Nice debates are easier to trigger if you actually explain what you mean by stuff like “unbalanced infinite progressivism” and whether you see any of it around. Sounds a lot like a false premise or vaguely strawmannish to me.
If that’s a false premise then so is infinite growth, which nobody has ever seen either
Sure, infinite growth is impossible, living on a finite world. I don’t see the relevance, though.
It isn’t clear what “unbalanced infinite progressivism” entails, how it looks, or where it’s happening. That makes it hard to know if OP is right to call it unreasonable. Particularly since they’re seeming pretty eager to get you to agree. (“Ain’t that right? That’s right, right? Can we all say that’s right?”)
Sure, once you reach utopia, you can stop progressing. Same as how you stop looking for a lost item after you find it.
What are we trying to find should then be a good question. What is it that we are still finding, that is still lost?
Equality and right to exist for everyone who does not ascribe to “traditional” cis-hetero-normative values for one.
As a cis man from Asia, I see we are definitely getting closer to accepting people with non-hetero preferences. There is progress, but I doubt some societies with extreme religious fundamentalism will change soon. It does not help that NATO loves weaponising trans people for neoliberal white power agenda.
It does not help that NATO loves weaponising trans people for neoliberal white power agenda.
Expand and explain further please.
…we are getting closer…
And therein lies the problem with your post imo. You decry the supplantation of “traditional” values but fail to acknowledge the reason for it is because the systems they’re built on are inherently oppressive, unjust, and built for the benefit of the few. “Getting closer” to accepting someone for the characteristics they exhibit that in no way impact others is not good enough. The systems that insist on slow rolling out human rights in order to preserve the comfort and avoid cognitive dissonance of “traditionalists” deserve to be torn down to the root
It does not help that NATO loves weaponising trans people for neoliberal white power agenda.
Expand and explain further please.
My description of the current “order” is cis normative western superimperialist surveillance capitalist media-military complex. If you looked at the history of, or how there is overwhelming presence of white people in police, military and capitalist positions in western countries, or how there is a “blue eyes blonde hair” preference among Europeans openly called for by the big Western media outlets during Ukrainian refugee escape (non-whites were stopped and beaten on Poland border), you can see it far more openly than your assumption of me not seeing things that seem obvious to you.
The goal of western superimperialist capitalist order has always been to consider whites at the top. The funding and encouragement for Muslim genocide in Palestine is a clear example. Muslim journalists were quickly ousted since October, and Arab resolution for ceasefire was vetoed by USA. You have African-Americans who got assimilated into western capitalism and today cheer for it and shit on Africans and Muslims as per convenience and for appeasing their white “masters”. English fascism never died with Hitler’s regime, it existed before and after it and still does. Uyghur genocide propaganda was fake western concern for Muslims, when China was protecting them from radicalisation.
The systems that insist on slow rolling out human rights in order to preserve
I think the “system” is already tearing apart, both itself and via social opposition. Capitalism is unsustainable, and that is the backbone of western imperialism with social discriminatory values embedded within it. USA’s skin colour based social order was inspiration for Hitler to enact racial segregation policies in Germany.
I’m not hearing how trans people fit into this. You know the Nazis killed a lot of trans people and the book burnings included the research of the time, right?
A lot of trans people and feminists are utilised to push Washington Consensus neoliberal agenda. It is not exclusively trans people. There are videos by CIA themselves on YouTube showing how they “celebrate” (assimilate) POCs and women.
It does not help that NATO loves weaponising trans people for neoliberal white power agenda.
Yeah like the other respondent I am absolutely going to request that you unpack this.
Responded to them.
Bro, where are these weaponized white power NATO trans people you speak of? I live in a city with a relatively high trans and LGBTQ+ population, and “white power” is about the furthest thing from describing what I see in that community.
For real, where are you getting your information from? This sounds like you watched some TikToks instead of going places where you could see for yourself.
They do not need to be weaponised directly for English fascism agenda. If they are immobilised using the lure of a good paying job in capitalism, they remain busy in bread and circus. This immobilisation of people has created an impossibility of revolution in western countries, and thus the stigma and hatred against socialism.
I’m sure you’re the expert on American society, living in Asia and all.
Maybe you are the white saviour nobody likes?
lmfao, this is where the shark has well and truly been jumped.
Infinite progressivism is not a thing that can exist. While growth is a number, which can theoretically stretch to infinity, progressivism is a political ideology with stated goals. Those may shift over time but there’s no infinite progressive path to follow.
I might challenge that. If a political organization achieves its stated goals I don’t think they dust their hands off & find new jobs.
It’s happened before that a group of people with a set of goals achieve those goals but continue to “push” out of habit, financial incentives, or a desire to solidify those goals more permanently. This can eventually lead to a bastardization of the original goals.
From a practical perspective this could create “infinite progressivism”.
Genuine question - do you feel that your “traditional” gender roles are threatened by the existence of trans people? If so, what makes you feel that way? As i see it, no one is advocating for the extinction of traditional gender roles. We just want the inclusion of non-traditional roles for those that don’t fit into “traditional” gender boxes.
It’s worth reflecting on how much of your apparent resentment toward non-traditional gender roles is a form of identity politics manufactured to sow division and distract from how we’re all being exploited anyways.
do you feel that your “traditional” gender roles are threatened by the existence of trans people?
Cis man from India. Not one bit. I have always welcomed trans and non-binary people, anonymous or not.
I am just more concerned with how “traditional” versus “progressive” is defined in various aspects of life that are not restricted to social discourse, and how we accept or deny them.
If you’re asking about a personal opinion: any policy purely based on tradition is worthless. Tradition is just peer pressure from dead people. Just like any peer pressure, it’s highly unlikely to produce anything but grief. If something is based purely on tradition without any other reason to exist, it’s unlikely to be an optimal policy.
Back to the initial question. I don’t think we can get infinitely progressive but we can keep subtracting the cruft of tradition until there is no necromantic peer pressure left at all. Mind that if something happens to be a tradition but still has a good reason to exist, it should be evaluated like any other idea in terms of being good or bad. I mean removing just one of the reasons to keep this idea. If it is left with zero reasons, it’s out. Otherwise it’s fair game.
any policy purely based on tradition is worthless. Tradition is just peer pressure from dead people.
The first part is correct. But the second part often is about creating sustainable or longlasting quality products, thinking for the long term and so on. So its not just useless peer pressure for redundant things. Partly it is though.
Mind that if something happens to be a tradition but still has a good reason to exist, it should be evaluated like any other idea in terms of being good or bad.
Someone finally gets it. Thanks!
I think there is some confusion between tradition and well-tested processes. I’d hardly consider creating quality products a tradition.
A lot of hardware tools makers, Japanese and German stationery item makers, or brands like Victorinox are considered a “tradition”. There is definitely not a mislabelling of tradition, but rather the definition in social discourse could be amended, or the understanding of tradition versus progressiveness understood better by people. I made this post for this reason.
Putting tradition opposite progress is a bad look. It’s choosing to do things the way you’ve always done them because that’s how you’ve always done them, as opposed to working towards a better way of doing things.
“Infinite progressivism” sounds like a conservative pejorative buzzword aimed at making progressive policies that benefit people look bad.
Making quality tools due to long-standing processes is definitely a different breed of tradition than oppressing minorities because they don’t fit someone’s “traditional” worldview.
To better illustrate my first post: The Victorinox craft isn’t high quality because it’s a tradition. It became a tradition because it’s high quality. If we subtract it being a tradition, we still have a reason to keep making it this way. The same cannot be said about oppressing people, unless one literally views human suffering as value added.
Their traditional part arises from them making tools in a factory in Switzerland to this day. Them sticking to that instead of outsourcing to anywhere else, roughly sticking to a composition for steel mixing, and very few amendments to tool designs is tradition.
It is no different for Sheaffer, Lamy, Staedtler, Pentel, Uni, Tombow and numerous writing instruments makers. There is definitely a rigid “tradition” in their process of doing things. You can likewise find this in many categories of items being made, guns (S&W), furniture, locks, keyboards, hell even ThinkPads. It is not some “formula”.
Of course, I did not come to discuss favourite brands, but that the meaning differs, and while this may simply be unspoken today, it is better to try and define these things to quantify and understand it as part of social sciences.
“Leftist”, “centrist” and “conservative”? This is not a the open discussion it is made out to be.
Having said that, those “traditional” values mentioned could easily be replaced with conservative values, especially when compared to the very individual, almost liberal, value of freedom to express oneself it is hard to see anything being “leftist” in the premiss of the discussion. Unless you are so far off the scale to the right that everything looks left…
My point is breaking the old norms should be seen as a flexible tool and not a rigid ideological thing where if you have a prybar, every problem looks like a crusty door.
So, norms that aren’t serving us should absolutely be broken. That’s not to say we can’t apply a little Chesterton’s Fence, look around for what purpose it serves, but the old norms aren’t holy for being old. If they aren’t net positive, fuck 'em.
I’m not sure I see how they’re comparable. Progressivism requires the ability to progress; if we somehow create a completely perfect utopia then there will be no room for progressivism, but otherwise there will always be some way to improve things and progress. In practice, there will always be some way to improve society which means infinite progressivism surely isn’t unreasonable?
Infinite growth isn’t possible because infinite money doesn’t exist, it’s as simple as that. And if infinite money did exist, infinite growth wouldn’t be possible because everything would already be infinitely large and therefore unable to grow any further…
… but beyond that, it also requires more and more people who can afford whatever the product/service in question is. Which requires either infinite people, infinite money or both. And as the product/service grows and prices likely increase, people will priced out of the market which is the opposite of infinite growth.
It’s also worth considering that progressivism is a mindset that is aiming for zero - zero problems, zero inequality, zero bigotry, etc. It’s not about pushing for infinite anything, it’s about trying to reduce existing issues. And while it’ll likely never reach its goal, it’s not theoretically or mathematically unreachable. It’s much more realistic to attempt to reduce something to zero than it is to increase it to infinity.
Not every change is an improvement, but every improvement is a change.
Infinite progressive would probably look something like Harrison Bergeron by Kurt Vonnegut. But I can’t think of any reason why we would pursue progressivism to that point. Ideology doesn’t snowball like capitalism. When the Ideology gets unfavorable people can easily switch sides and push back. When an economic system is unfavorable the people have very little power to change it.
A lot better than some of the weird defensive replies. Thanks.
My only proposition with this topic is to make people think if every “old” thing needs to be uprooted, or if selective things are changed to bring a better balance to society. Everything is clearly not a problem, and problems are more specific than that. An example would be “traditional” way of making products that last long and are sustainable, as opposed to “modern” capitalist way of making products.
You’re conflating two separate things: capitalism as a system and progressivism/traditionalism/conservativism as an ideology. The “traditional” way of making products was capitalism as well, just a less efficient form. And progressivism can be applied to capitalism as an economic system as well (i.e., globalization or automation).
Often some of these labels are stuck to capitalism, which I am trying to also think of as absurd. Defining traditional aspects can help see what is beneficial for us, as we forge society into something anti-capitalistic.
Why do you consider it absurd?
Because label associations are often not based on objective thinking, but rather for reductive uncritical thinking purposes, to discard nuance, to put people in boxes.
But are you not doing that very thing with your comments in this thread re: left leading ideology and progressives? I don’t mean that as an attack, just pointing out that it’s extremely hard to break out of that habit/mode of discourse even for the most well-meaning
Traditional capitalism back in the day was sweatshops and traveling snake oil salesmen.
In modern times, that’s sweatshops in India and drug ads on TV with 'tiny text of ‘This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.’
For sustainability - we clearcut forests and filled coastlines without restraint - that’s not sustainable and we had to stop because there aren’t as much left.
I don’t think the last is necessarily the source of goodness that you seem to think it is.Would sustainable long lasting products be considered “capitalism” or “traditional”? Isn’t sustainability not a capitalist thing? Would it not be a good “traditional” thing, since we have decades old products we are able to reuse without buying new stuff? How or what would exactly be bad in this?
I think you’re placing too much value on the label in this discussion.
E.g., you could make houses out of redwood beams back in the day. It was great - insect resistant, fire resistant. Lasts a long time. Problem is that these trees take much too long to grow, and there’s no way they’re coming back any time soon. You’re mining a nonrenewable resource and you’re going to run out (and also kill an ecosystem). That’s an unsustainable business practice.
Also, people are much more disposable oriented than you seem to be considering. Japanese houses last for like 20 years before they’re considered in need of replacement. I’ve seen a brand new house in the US, 3 years old, be razed and rebuilt because the rich owner wanted the building made his way, and not the way the former owner built it.
I don’t agree with either statement. We can always be better because we’ll never be perfect.
Frankly, I’m not interested in debating your regressive social views here.
Simple mathematics. We all share a finite pie; infinite growth cannot happen because it means that people want perpetually larger and larger slices of the same pie; there’s no such thing as “infinite progressivism” because once everyone has an equal slice, it ends.
@TheAnonymouseJoker how can it be infinite?
“Progressive” implies progress towards a goal. Once they reach the goal they no longer have to keep progressing towards it.
I would be careful not to mix up what I’ll distinguish here as liberal social progressivism and communist societal progressivism. I’m sure there are more established terms for these concepts but I don’t know them or can’t think of them.
The imbalance we see in the liberal version is because it is, just like social conservatism, a reaction to current material conditions without a proper (ie dialectic) understanding of these how these conditions came to be and how they can be changed. Therefore it falls into the same paradigms and pitfalls which liberalism itself does, and is incapable of actually fixing the issues of the day. Then they get all caught up in things like “traditional” vs “modern” values, distinctions which are meaningless since both broad groups have been enforced across history in intimate relation to the reigning ruling class ideology of the time.
Whereas the type of progressivism we communists see as necessary is a holistic remaking of society, not limited to pushing for equal treatment of out groups, but banishing even the concept of out groups to the scrapheap of history, just to give one example. We go even further though, not in an “endless growth” type of sociopathic way, but in a strategic and structured way so as to fundamentally change the structure of society around us also on the political and economic levels, so that we can peacefully coexist on a human level rather than constantly struggling for who gets the upper hand.
not in an “endless growth” type of sociopathic way, but in a strategic and structured way so as to fundamentally change the structure of society
Grad users keep swinging me back :/
necessary is a holistic remaking of society
What exactly would classify as not “traditional” in a pejorative sense? “Traditional” sustainable way of making products and goods versus “modern” evil ways of making garbage products? I was trying to get some answers and ideas through this thread on the aspect of what is bad “traditional” versus good “traditional” thing, but some are mistaking me for entirely wrong reasons.
Let’s put the question back to you since you claim everyone else is misunderstanding: what do you consider to be good and bad “traditional” things? And how is progressivism, in your opinion, impacting both?
I… made this post exactly for asking that. How can we define traditionalism? What is it exactly? After all, it is not limited to just horrible societal feudalistic practices we demonise so much. There are traditional gender norms preferred openly by all, as well as “traditional” methods of creating sustainable and longlasting products, something rare and unseen today.
There are traditional gender norms preferred openly by all…
Hard disagree.
Also, who in your opinion is demonizing all traditional practices? Seems like you’re starting with a conclusion (progressive movements are trying to throw all traditionalism out of the window) which 1. is tautological, and 2. is reductive and makes a lot of unfounded (imo) leaps in logic
Atleast I see things happen that way in social discourse, on social media, and on people trying to fake personalities based on social agendas to gain brownie points. And I do not like it, which is why I am careful in refusing to follow whatever seems trendy to the left. People happen to follow trends and think in a binary manner, and discarding nuance is heavily encouraged via constant information overflow on internet and media.
Everything you’ve said could apply to the opposite side (i.e., non-left). The argument you’ve posited betrays bias toward more conservative ideology and politics which I’d argue is in contrast to some of your other comments in the thread where you’ve claimed to have no agenda necessarily one way or another.
Also, I’d argue that certain things do not need discussion or nuanced review as they are prima facie absurd/anti-social/harmful…etc., so while i do agree that all peolple engage in bandwaggoning and reactivity in social discourse (including myself above), I don’t necessarily agree that this is a bad thing when it comes to ideologies that aim to oppress, suppress, and otherwise disenfranchise individuals or groups of individuals based on immutable characteristics such as race, gender, sexual orientation, national origin…etc
Does it not apply already? I assumed the left is capable of civil discourse and self critique. If what I proposed is in conservative bias (which it is not but assuming), my years of history, not including Lemmygrad, tells otherwise.
Discussion is the fabric of social discourse and progressivism. You are saying the opposite, so does that make you a conservative? I can play this nasty game too, but I hate it and am not immoral enough to do this. If you do not want to discuss, just sit on the sidelines. But do not play games. There are enough walls in this thread to talk to.
