input
stringlengths 89
9.33k
| output
stringclasses 2
values | instruction
stringclasses 1
value |
|---|---|---|
CMV: I believe Pedophiles deserve the same rights as a Homosexual. +
+ For many years, homosexuals were penalised and even killed, simply for being a homosexual, regardless of whether they acted upon their urges or not. This still happens today.
We also see many pedophiles being penalised simply for being a pedophile, regardless of whether or not they've acted upon their urges.
If someone is revealed to be a pedophile, they are instantly put on the sex-offenders list. Even if they have not performed an illegal act.
It is my belief that only criminals should be punished for crimes. Intent =/= Action. Similarly Pedophile =/= Child-Molester.
There ARE child-molesting pedophiles, of course, and I do believe they should be reprimanded. They have committed a crime. Similarly, I do believe that possession and distribution of child pornography is a punishable crime. If there is a victim, there is a crime. Possessing child porn means you condone the acts depicted.
There are many pedophiles who have not committed a crime such as molestation or looked at child porn. Yet they are penalised if found out! What have they done wrong?
In a similar strain I believe lolicon (drawn depictions of child porn) should be legal, as there is no victim (so long as it wasn't traced from/inspired by real child-porn). Same goes for underage erotica (that is entirely fictitious). Both of these are protected by free-speech, and neither have a victim. If anything, they provide an outlet for sexual frustration. So why are so many websites banning such content on 'Legal Grounds'?
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: There is a 'Normal' state and Homosexuality and Autism and the like are irregular states. +
+ "Normal"
(adj.) Conforming to the standard or common type.
---
By the above definition, we can be sure that there is a 'Normal' human being. Or at the very least, various 'Normal' states to make up a 'Normal' human being.
Anything that is in the majority is a 'Normal' state. So, the 'Normal' human being is a Cisgendered, Heterosexual, Chinese man.
This means that states such as Transgender, Homosexual, Autistic etc. are not 'Normal'. They are in fact 'different'. and we desperately need to stop acting as if they are normal. They are different.
This does not mean they are worse, undesirable or negative. Nor does it mean they are better, desirable or positive. They are simply different.
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Dr. Seuss should be required High School literature before "classics" such as Steinbeck, Dickens, and even Shakespeare +
+ My reasoning behind this is, for the most part the above authors lack lessons. While they don't all always, the biggest thing teachers enjoy is pointing out the themes behind each book. Why do themes matter? Why should students learn about literature in the past when we learn about the past from History?
Dr. Seuss's books contain lessons. Being yourself, being creative, not being an asshole, caring about the planet, etc.
I'm not picking out those authors exclusively, they're just some examples I thought of since I've read some of their works and I was disappointed (I guess you could say I had Great Expectations) because I'm in school to learn, and most of these books are rather dull and don't teach me anything besides themes that parallel from human nature back then to now. It's annoying reading Of Mice and Men and seeing all of these themes about friendship and loyalty in the great depression and not coming out a better person after reading it. You could stretch for several lessons but they're mostly reiterations of the themes.
So I feel like the school system is failing me by dulling me down with pointless "theme-based" literature rather than literature with lessons and morals that could prepare us for the world we're gonna face. Not just themes in the world we can relate to, but how to not be a dick or how to plant a tree or stay creative while aging seem pretty important.
So in order to not completely hate the school system and rant at my teacher and probably not do any homework based on the theme-based literature, CMV.
*For clarification, USA high schools. Not sure how other countries do their classes but our English classes have mandatory books read throughout the country. It's hard to find someone who hasn't read (or Sparknoted) Of Mice and Men, the Catcher in the Rye, Catch 22, and a bunch of Shakespeare stuff from middle/high school*
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Executive wage caps would increase jobs, wages and, therefore, tax revenue while decreasing the influence the super wealthy have in politics. +
+ Let me start by saying that I am not an economics expert and I'm sure it's probably not as simple and obvious as it seems or we would've done this by now.
Simply put, I think that many of America's economic problems could be fixed by placing a cap on total compensation for executives, let's say $5 million. This would have no effect on small businesses, of course, but would have a major positive impact on major corporations like, for instance, wal-mart. According to [this](http://www1.salary.com/Wal-Mart-Stores-Inc-Executive-Salaries.html) site, wal-mart paid it's top 6 execs just over $50 million combined. So, with a $5 mil wage cap wal-mart would have over $20 mil in surplus cash which it would then, logically, invest into more warehouses, factories and stores, creating more jobs.
Walmart wouldn't be the only company doing this, though, most of the biggest companies would be doing the same with their sudden surpluses which would lead to a labor shortage which would drive up salaries and benefits for the average workers. More people making more money leads to more business for all companies and more tax revenue for cash-strapped local, state, and federal governments. Everyone wins.
Bonus: The super wealthy will no long be willing to make such huge political contributions. Who would drop $50 mil on a candidate, who might not even win, if it'll take them a decade to earn that money back?
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: it is normal for adults to be attracted to people who are in their late teens. +
+ I did not know this was an unpopular opinion until recently. Basically my stance is as follows.
People in their late teens are fully physically developed and have all the qualities that other adults find sexually appealing. They are sexual beings both physically and mentally. So it is evident to me that the Natural Order of Things supports my view.
Feel free to correct me if I am wrong but, for all of human history up until recently people regularly married people in their late teens and they were seen as adults. I think the change in perception can be attributed to three things:
1. People now marry later in life, the norm in this culture is to sleep around when they are younger. Adding on to that...
2. We have a hookup culture. In the past people may have been more serious about relationships (feel free to correct me if I am wrong) but nowadays a lot of people just hook up and marry when they want to "settle down" later in life. As a result people more readily assume that anyone interested in a younger person is up to no good and isn't serious. Which is probably the source of aversion to this kind of attraction; because they want to protect them.
3. People nowadays do not consider people in their late teens to be adults while in the past they were. I think this could be a result of how present society coddles people even through their college years whereas many later-year teens have the potential to be a functional adult with a job, spouse and kids if raised differently. Probably a result of people getting married later in life which is a result of promiscuity due to culture and availability of contraception.
Furthermore I would actually assert that forbidding relationships based on age, given that both are ready physically and mentally for that kind of relationship, is immoral; because you are stepping in the way of love, no one is getting hurt (besides pain of breakup if that happens), etc.
So basically the only thing I see that supports the argument against my view is that culture opposes it. While culture and soceity's rules may be influenced by truth, they are arbitrary. Society's rules are nothing in the face of objective truth (refer to my statement about the Natural Order of Things above) If they are not molded after it already. Adding on to this, I've heard (again, feel free to correct me if I am wrong) that women's brains become fully mature at ~17 and men's brains become fully mature at ~23. Its why in the past, men were legally considered minors at a later age than women were. If you make the argument that someone cannot rightfully enter a relationship with an adult until their brain is fully mature, you would be forced to also agree that ~17 y/o women should be available and that men should not be available until ~23. My own solution to this is that maturity in decision making is not wholly dependent on this one variable. Many adults don't make very "adult" decisions and many teens make responsible, "adult" decisions. This is, instead, something to assess regarding the individual, which applies to people 20+ as well.
Also I do not believe that such relationships hurt anyone by default. One person may be more inexperienced but that is a vulnerability that the other person does not have to exploit if they are a decent human being after the right thing.
A bit of context: I'm a 21 y/o college student and do find myself attracted to people in their late teens, as well as adults. I feel that this is normal and natual and not a fetish or somehing that is uncommon. I do not get off on domination or whatever like some people think those who have this attraction do. I just find that my brain recognizes those people as fellow adults. I'm also not looking to hook up, I'm a actually abstaining from sex until marriage and take all my relationships seriously; no "spring flings" or whatever for me.
My grandparents met and started dating when grandma was 16 and grandpa was 21. They were and are both very happy and have a good marriage. Imagine if they had dismissed each other as unavailable or were prevented from being together. (Refer to how I said that this kind of prevention is immoral).
ELI5 TLDR: People in their late teens many times cannot be differentiated from other "adults" if you did not know their age. So it is normal to be attracted to them and the current taboo is only a recent, arbitrary social rule based on nothing more than culture.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: I believe exiling people is a way better alternative than jail +
+ Coming from a country that used to do this a lot (Venezuela), I believe that it would be way better than using jailtime.
A regular prisioner costs around 30 000 USD per year, and by exiling them out of the country not only do you save all that money, you also get rid of the part of the population that was breaking the law, the part you want to get rid off.
In the end I just believe that getting rid of criminals by exiling them rather than placing them in jail is cheaper, and better overall for the country.
-For the many People asking about which countries would accept them consider this example: USA has a several-times drug offender who could get 55 years of jail (1.6M USD) or be exiled to Uruguay. Uruguay can get this educated american and could benfit from having a better working and promote american immigration (This has happened before with Venezuela and Europe and it led to the best decade ever for the country), also many less competent countries promote more competent countries' immigration, which doesn't happen often, besides these countries also are often more open to many crimes that more competent nations are not
-This is coming way too often, if you are skeptical of the fact that there are unfair, life long, jail sentences, here read [this] (http://famm.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/Chart-All-Fed-MMs-NW.pdf) if TL;DR 1000 plants of cannabis, 1g of LSD, or 50g of meth can get you life sentence
-This is in light of United States condemming Venezuela's Presidents decision to exile Leopoldo Lopez
-This post is reuploaded! thanks for the comments and keep them coming
- I'm not suggesting exiling serial killers or others of the sort, just for minor offences (marijuana, prostitution, ect) sending them to places where this is legal and give them the option for jail or exile
- Feel free to correct my grammar
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: I believe a Palestine state should be established in the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt +
+ The state of Palestine has 4 million people residing within Isreal. The West Bank and Gaza strip together have 6,000 square kilometers of land. The North Sinai Governorate alone has 27,000 square Kilometers of land, that's more land than even Isreal has (22,000 sq km).
[Here is what a State of Palestine could look like on a map, either with only the Northern part or the full peninsula.](http://sinaimaps.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/governorates-sinai-egypt.jpg)
One could argue that the Sinai Peninsula is mostly desert and unfit for people to live in, but Israel was mostly desert when they began immigrating to the region too. Irrigation, agriculture, forestry, and artificial canals have been known to combat or reverse desertification.
The people already residing there can be promised equal citizenship rights in the new state of Palestine. Egypt could even allow for the people there to have duel citizenship, so that they can choose to either stay in the new state or easily move to inland Egypt. If necessary, Egypt could offer incentives for Sinai people to move inland prior to the establishment of the state.
If a "buffer" line/zone were felt to be necessary, it could be jointly run by Israel and Egypt stationed outside the borders without much issue from the Palestinians. The U.N. Security council could send peacekeepers to the peninsula to monitor the region's development. There would be very little reason for any of the Security members to veto this decision if Egypt, Israel, and Palestine all agreed to this.
Albeit, it's extremely unlikely this will ever happen, but I think it would be a good solution. Which is why I'm here, what is wrong with this plan?
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV : /r/Funny is not Funny +
+ "providing fun; causing amusement or laughter; amusing; comical:"
Out of most default subs that get up-voted on the front page /r/funny is the the least amusing. It's the lowest common denominator type of stuff , lowest of the low hanging fruit , so processed that most corporations could use material for marketing PR , it's like coffee without caffeine , 2Pac - Hit Em Up without insults..
Basically it is not authentically amusing content. It feels like forcing you into safe cute giggle rather than genuinely amuse you. | malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Raising your voice during arguments is fine (when there aren't, e.g. children around). +
+ I just had my dad tell me to lower my voice during an argument, but often I'm not even aware I'm raising it.
I, personally, don't think raising your voice during an argument is a bad thing - when you're angry, you often can't talk calmly and it's fucking stupid to call someone out on something that's completely normal to do when they're upset, particularly in the way that my dad called me out, namely, "Am I raising my voice? I'm talking to you in a normal voice". I think it's a normal reaction, and it shouldn't be seen as something we need to tone down (unless we are in, say, a public place). When you're angry, you're by definition unable to be calm, and yet people treat it as some sort of heinous fault.
I suppose this is as much a rant as a CMV, so sorry if this isn't in the right sub. | malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV:The criticism of "nice guys" (as seen in r/niceguys) is not valid. +
+ The reasoning behind this view is that everyone is entitled to human companionship, and that these guys are frustrated/critical of flaws they see in our current cultural mating patterns. Single guys suffering deserve as much respect and empathy as women who may face different challenges. Also, these guys are often being vulnerable to their crushes and trying to start a romantic relationship. Even if the other party isn't interested, it's brave of them and they shouldn't be mocked for their courage.
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Trigger warnings are fine +
+ Tw: this might upset people who become overly aggressive about trigger warnings.
A trigger warning is effectively just the passage of information from one party to another. It is no different from an R rating on a movie, an M rating on a video game, or a TV-MA rating on a show. All it does is alert people to the possible repercussions of the content to follow. Be careful to note that I am not saying it is okay to vindictively attack those who do not use trigger warnings, I am merely saying that there is a reason why we have things like rating systems. We are trying to protect people by informing them of content that could be bad, and expecting them to act appropriately on that information. Again, this is not to say people don't attack others because they don't use trigger warnings; that's a different argument though, because that's on them. | resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: If pro-life views are ever to become law in the future, it must be done by covering the costs of birth and contraceptives first. +
+ I am pro life obviously. I offer a critique on the "angle" of the traditional pro-life lobby.
* I believe the goal of centrist\populist pro-lifers, so EXCLUDING the extreme\radical holders, is to minimize abortions, not maximize children.
* And thus contraception poses no ethical qualms with the above viewpoint.
* Abortion is often a more financially advantageous position compared to putting a child up for adoption.
* To nip in the bud a follow up to the above statement, I realize making it financially ADVANTAGEOUS (though way of say a credit for children born) would create a "cobra market."
I also believe forcing women who have been raped or are in risky pregnancies to complete their births is wrong.
So I believe for someone who is seriously pro-life, it should be seen as a step in the right direction to obtain that goal, by eliminating reasons why a person would or should choose to end a pregnancy. | resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Having children is a selfish, immoral act +
+ One of the biggest problems in the world is overpopulation, there are just too many people on Earth. Add to that, there are tons of unadopted children who need a home, but people feel the need to have children that share their genes. People are just having children to fulfill their selfish desires and bring meaning to their lives. People often say that we need to propagate the human race, but with over six billion people on the planet, it seems like that's definitely not in danger of happening anytime soon.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV:Earned Income Tax Credits are a much better idea than raising the minimum wage, and avoid pretty much all of the issues that otherwise come up with a high minimum wage. +
+ The way I currently understand Earned Income Tax Credits (EITC), when you pay your taxes, if you make below a certain amount of money are not supporting yourself, then you basically get tax credits, or money from the government, rather than having to pay taxes.
I think this would be better than minimum wage because:
1. Raising minimum wage directly incentivizes automation. These jobs are already the most vulnerable to automation (I'm thinking about jobs like cashiers). The more expensive it is to pay an employee, the more likely it is that employers will look for ways to automate those jobs. EITC avoids this because it won't the employers who directly front the costs of increasing revenue for those within a certain income bracket.
2. Not everyone deserves a $15 per hour wage. To be clear, I am fully on board with the the idea that somebody who is supporting themselves and working 40 hours per week should be able to make a living wage. For those who are in that situation, I think EITC should compensate whatever wages they make such that their yearly salary is sufficient. However, there are also 15 year olds who just want a summer job, and definitely aren't supporting themselves. By excluding those who aren't supporting themselves (I think the criteria is that you're under 26 and provide less than half of the money needed to support yourself), we avoid paying people excessive salaries when they don't really need to be paid that much. | resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: I'm a white female and I see nothing wrong with using "nigga" as a friendly nickname. +
+ So some background on me… I'm 19 years old, and I've always been very excepting of almost everyone ( religious extremists not included)
I've also grown up listening to tons and tons of rap music… So intern I picked up the habit of using "nigga" not as a term of deride but as a term of endearment… I call my best friends Nigga … And I've noticed that lately lots of other people of my age are doing the same thing… but we also were blessed to grow up in a time where there wasn't that strong racial tension between whites and blacks, with the growing stamina of the black lives matter movement I'm a bit worried that this is going to get me into trouble… But I still don't see anything wrong with that as long as I don't use it as a derogatory term… I totally believe that nigga is very different from nigger. I'm full aware of the reasons that "nigger" is an awful hateful term.. But fear of a word's meaning with out adaptability only increases The impossibility of challenging the very things that word was based on. If we start using "nigga" in a positive way it won't vanquish all the wrongs done to African American's but it will be everyday proof of progress being made.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Transgender people are still technically their original gender. +
+ Hi guys!
To expand:
Although I would happily call someone who went from being a man to a woman (- for example) a woman to their face and when talking about them, I still don't believe they are truly that gender. Despite having surgery, having that mindset and having hormone treatment, I can't feel fully comfortable referring to them as a woman - just from a technical standpoint. I feel as though I'm lying to myself.
Disclaimer:
I am not homophobic or anything of the sort. I completely agree with people doing what they want to do and I completely believe people can be 'trapped' in the body of the opposite gender. | malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: I believe that Pixar and Disney and top 3D animation movie companies should create move adult theme movies, similar to Anime. +
+ Pixar and Disney make great films. Most of the top 3D animation companies do make great movies. But they are all kid themed. Imagine if these companies could diverse their portfolios if they dealt with more adult themes. Basically, the 3D companies could do what is done with Japanese animation.
This would great for the movie industry and they could use technology to do what you can't do with real actors.
For example, Pixar could have done a great Ghost in the Shell 3D reboot.
Some of Pixar's top movies are 'Toy Story,Up, Finding Nemo' which are comedic and some have child themes.
Anime in Japan as far as I can tell seems to have been very successful with exploring adult themes including topics such as science fiction, horror, crime dramas. But the 3D animation companies that are American based only seem to focus on comedy or child themes. It just seems that 3D animation and technology can create these amazing worlds, it is just unfortunate that the worlds are all targeted towards entertaining children.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV : The VAST majority of abortions are done out of convenience or to conceal their pregnancy. +
+ * Rape & risky pregnancies make up only a fraction of total abortions. (and for the sake of argument, this cmv isn't about this, we'll assume these cases if legitimate are allowed to be aborted)
* Adoption is a real alternative for essentially all other pregnancies.
The current objections I see seem to fall into two categories.
* Overplaying the inconvenience and burden of pregnancy, implying that those inconveniences aught to override any fetal centric perspective.
* Arguing risk from a non-zero angle ("You can DIE in child birth")
* The last argument more or less boils down to wanting to conceal pregnancies, valuing the mother's life over the child's.
This I think is something that the pro-choice side really tries to argue its way around, trying to present this as something noble, when it's really just terminating fetuses out of convenience or shame. | malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Transgender women should not be allowed to compete in women's sports +
+ (At least not at the collegiate or professional level)
My younger brother and I were listening to a story on the radio regarding a controversy concerning a transgender high school student not being allowed to tryout for a female sport (softball, I believe).
My brother, who is 6'4 230lbs, just recently gave up competitive boxing. For a while there was some hope that he would turn professional, but he just couldn't seem to get over the hump. While he couldn't quite make the cut in men's heavyweight boxing, I'm sure he'd absolutely dominate women in that weight class. He joked that, if they allow this, he should become a trans woman boxer.
He would never do this and was just joking (sorry if it seems insensitive), but I'm sure that there are some opportunists out there that would. Allowing them to do so would surely ruin women's sports.
For the record, I have no problem with a transgender man playing men's sports, just like I have no problem with a female playing men's sports (if able to compete on that level).
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: House music is boring when played 'live'. +
+ (By 'Live' I mean it is being played during a mix by a DJ at a festival, rave or other similar event. I do not include live bands in this definition.)
I want to start by saying that I love electronic music, and I have an appreciation for all the iterations of it. My favourite genre by far is Drum & Bass, but I still love to listen to other sub genres of EDM and will happily dance to them at live events.
House music has always been a genre that's been on my radar, but one that I've never really delved too deeply into. The few tracks I heard at raves and on the radio were cool but nothing that particularly grabbed my attention. This past summer I've been to a fair few festivals and raves, and in the last one especially, there was *a lot* of House being played. At first I was fine with it, but after a while it started to grate.
House music is great for casual listening or at a party, but when I'm actually at a live event and wanting to dance, my friends and I got so bored! I know it's cliche and generally untrue to say this about electronic music, but it was repetitive, slow, and the elongated build ups were followed simply by another generic beat and bland bassline. It got to the point where my friends and I just stopped dancing and went outside to the smoking area for some variety.
House music is boring when played live. CMV.
**TL;DR House is slow and repetitive and does little to make you want to dance at a live event.**
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: The drive to be sympathetic and kind towards people is entirely dependent on an expectation of reciprocity. So I see no reason why pariahs should be sympathetic or nice towards people beyond their best interest +
+ I don't see any reason why people would be sympathetic towards others, or nice or caring towards others unless there's a certain expectation that they will be treated the same by them. Perhaps not directly, vis-a-vis. That is, that just because you do something nice for someone that someone owes you someway. But unless you have a certain guarantee that you will be treated like a peer by those people, I don't see why you'd treat them better than they'd treat you.
For that reason, people who are pariahs have no reason to be sympathetic or nice towards other people. Sure, there's the common courtesies that are unavoidable unless you want to raise a stink wherever you go; but other than that, going that extra mile to be "the nice guy" or being sympathetic to the troubles of other people who look down on you? It's irrational. Why should you treat them better than they treat you, if there's no guarantee that you will be treated the same? Moreover, there's a chance they'll mistreat you, due to your pariah status.
I see this comment about being "genuinely nice and sympathetic" and "treating people nicely" about those socially-inept men whom people call Nice Guys, or otherwise loners and social rejects that always strikes me as completely absurd. Why would they treat other people with more respect, sympathy and niceness than that with which they are treated by their peers? That's a very serf-like.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
Taking Mod Applications +
+ Hello CMVers!
We are seeking a few good men (or women) to help us with moderation duties.
We are particularly looking for mods who are around during the hours many of us are asleep, since a lot of us are eastern time in the US/Canada.
If you're interested, please reply below with answers to the following:
1. How much time do you spend on reddit, and how much of that is spent on CMV?
2. What times during the day and week do you browse reddit? Please use GMT format.
3. What time zone do you live in?
3. Is there anything wrong with /r/changemyview, and if so, what would you do to improve it?
4. What would you consider a bannable offence?
5. A post/comment has gone up and your gut says that it doesn't fit in the subreddit but you can't work out which rule it breaks. What do you do?
6. How familiar do you feel with the nuance of CMV's rules?
7. Why do you want to be a moderator of CMV?
8. CMV: Bagels are the best breakfast food. | resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Making fun of a person who eats gluten free is just as bad as making fun of a religious person +
+ So I'll start off by saying that in no way am I promoting the "gluten free diet" or any other so called "fad" diets such as paleo, keto etc...
Essentially my viewpoint is that making fun of, or telling an individual who chooses to follow these diets that they are naïve and trying to convince them not to follow them is just as bad as making fun of, or saying the same things to a religious individual, such as a Muslim or Jew who cannot eat pork or must eat halal, or kosher food.
In both instances there is no general scientific consensus that agrees with the choices the individuals make; however, in both cases the individuals feel good about their choices whether it be because they feel like they are following the will of their God, or because they believe they are eating healthier. I do make an exception for diets which are unsustainable and will eventually cause either malnutrition or an eating disorder etc… but some diets, such as gluten free or dairy free, do not cause this issue, and the individuals feel great when they do it, whether or not it is a placebo or a result of other factors is irrelevant. I see a lot of hate on people who follow these diets on the internet and in person and I don’t really understand why. If the individuals is an adult and chooses to practice this lifestyle we should respect it as much as we respect individuals who practice their religions. In both cases I agree that if they shove it in people’s faces and try to convert people they know, it is annoying, but if they keep to themselves and understand that it is not for everyone, I don't see a reason for all the hate on people who follow these lifestyles.
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: You shouldn't own a dog. +
+ I think you probably shouldn't own a dog - except maybe you are blind, an old-school shepherd or train them for finding people after avalanches or earthquakes. I have several reasons to holdthis view - here they are, sorted by relevance (from least to most relevant).
* They eat poo.
* They are annoying. Many people have really strong opinions against smoking in public, because it is upsetting them and accordingly laws have been past in many countries that limit/prohibit smoking in public transport, public buildings, etc. However, it is not uncommon to be leg-humped by a dog in the bus, or step into dog-poo in the park, which I find really annoying. This seems to be regarded as unproblematic, some pepole even get annoyed if you do not want to touch their animal companion with questionable hygiene standards.* You may say that (contrary to smoking) these are merely inconveniences, but in fact...
* ...Some dogs are plain dangerous. Have a look at the ["Fatal dog attacks"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fatal_dog_attacks_in_the_United_States) wiki entry. Granted, there are MUCH more people dying from cars, cigaretts, cancer (and that's only deadly stuff with a C), etc. but in my opinion even one person would be too much. There are a lot of young children on the list as well.
* My rant so far may have given you the opinion that I just hate animals. However, the opposite is true - I love them! Therefore I think we shouldn't keep them for our amusement or because we fancy a walk once or twice a day.
* They eat. In a world where people are starving this is in my opinion morally not justifiable.
* Most importantly: They produce greenhouse gases - and quite a lot of them! [The co2-"paw print" of a big dog that gets fed mostly meat may even be bigger than the emissions caused by an SUV.](http://www.salon.com/2014/11/20/the_surprisingly_large_carbon_paw_print_of_your_beloved_pet_partner/)
Therefore I am convinced that you probably shouldn't own a dog. I will not be convinced by single examples where a dog was useful, but by reasons why the overall benefits of private dog-owenership surpass the negetive effects I have listed above. Please CMV!
(*)The fanatic dog-loving may be an issue particular to Germany.
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Washington DC should not be a state. +
+ So this is a direct instance of a broader point: In a nation-state like the USA, the national--federal--capital should be outside of any state being represented.
I'm not from DC, but my family moved there a few years ago and I had this debate recently with them.
I fully respect the wishes of DC residents to be represented, and I think that the problem started way earlier. The problem is that in DC as it is right now, there's too much going on that is not directly related to it being the seat of the national government.
I believe that the seat of national government should be just that, the seat of national government. And nothing else. In my ideal world, DC would consist of federal government buildings and embassies, as well as essential services to support those, and that's it.
I have no problem with some of the solutions that have been proposed, including moving much of the area of DC within the boundaries of either Maryland or Virginia. However, no area that has as its role being the seat of the national government should also be a state.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: /r/hiphopheads shouldn't have ban on discussions or posts regarding Lil Dicky. +
+ Lil Dicky’s debut album, *Professional Rapper*, debuted atop the Billboard Rap Album chart, and at number 7 on the Billboard 200, with sales of 22,000. It features guest spots from Snoop Dogg, Fetta Wap, Rich Homie Quan, Jace (from Two-9), and T-Pain. Yet /r/hiphopheads, arguably the best place to discuss rap & hip-hop on the internet, forbids all discussion (whether it be links or even discussion threads) regarding his music. If I’m not mistaken, there are two reasons for the ban:
* Someone in his camp posted one of his videos to Reddit, and either LD or that someone asked their friends to upvote the video. This was claimed to be vote manipulation a or publicity stunt.
* LD is making a mockery of the genre (a hip-hop Weird Al, so to speak) and isn’t a “real” rapper.
First, there’s never been proof (from what I can tell) that LD or his camp took part in malicious vote manipulation. It doesn’t seem at all like he’s rap’s /u/Unidan. Second, /r/HHH allows links and discussion threads for The Lonely Island. That alone should indicate at least a slight bias against LD’s music.
I’m not an LD Stan or anything; if anything I lean towards some of [Fantano’s critisicms of him]( http://www.theneedledrop.com/articles/2015/8/lil-dicky-professional-rapper). I’m just saying that the dude’s got the best-selling rap album in the country until Dre’s numbers come in for *Compton*. He clearly has fans, probably a bunch on /r/HHH, and obviously a bunch on Reddit as a whole. If you want to karma-earning links because of “vote manipulation,” I disagree because of a lack of proof but I suppose that’s not ***that*** outrageous. But a complete ban (including discussion threads for fresh releases and albums) is overkill and unnecessary.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Making the decision to have children is ethically unjustifiable. +
+ Making the decision to have children is ethically unjustifiable.
Bringing a child into this world cannot be justified due to a human beings capacity to experience suffering. If you bring a child into this world, it is pretty much a given that it will suffer in some way - and many times, this suffering can be catastrophic. Put simply, there is no way to justify this suffering when it can be so easily avoided by simply not having babies.
By "suffering" I mean anything and everything - from something as simple as a cold, to anxiety about money, suffering from severe illness, becoming homeless, stress and any number of other things that can cause suffering in a person's life.
Bringing a child into this world makes you responsible for all the suffering throughout a child's life - had you not taken the decision to have a child, the child would not have suffered, because he would not exist.
This is exacerbated by the fact that the "default position" for humanity is suffering. By this I mean that if you do *absolutely nothing*, you will suffer. You have to exert a great deal of effort not to suffer - you need to constantly provide yourself with food, shelter and protection - if you don't you will starve, get cold, etc. This means that by bringing a child into the world, you are forcing them to exert effort to prevent themselves from suffering.
This may be justifiable if we were given the option to "opt out", but we are not. People will do *everything in their power* to prevent people from opting-out (and by this I mean taking one's own life). Examples: even on a forum as open as Reddit, we are still forbidden to discuss opting out. Anyone who has taken the decision to opt out and wants to find out how to do so quickly and painlessly will find themselves unable to do so. Medicines that give this option are strictly controlled, with harsh penalties for breaking the laws. Jumping spots are patrolled or fenced off. Anyone attempting to discuss opting out openly risks being detained in a medical institution against their will and possibly even forcibly medicated.
A common response to this argument is, "Look at all the joy and beauty that can be experienced in life". My counter-response is that such joy is not a given, as suffering is. Additionally, if one wishes to experience many of the good things in life, they have to exert *even more* effort than they do simply to hold off their suffering. The probability of experiencing suffering, and the amount of suffering likely to be experienced is also greater than that of the probability of experiencing joy, given that suffering is the "default state".
Another argument against that is that anyone deciding *not* to have children simply cannot be held responsible for depriving a person of joy - since such a person does not exist.
There is also no good reason to bring children into this world in despite of suffering. The future of humanity is often bought up, but none of us have any reasonable interest in the future of mankind since none of us will be alive to experience it. It's a moot point. Nobody will suffer if humanity comes to an end due to people not having babies.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: a significant % of non-voters do not vote because they do not have confidence in any party. Countries should have a 'no confidence' vote in elections if they want to increase turnout, while achieving a better understanding of the public's perception of the political climate. +
+ In New Zealand between the last two elections there was a significant increase in funding pushing for a better voting turnout. For many years now they have made it compulsory to register, however measures such as these seem to be highly ineffective globally at getting an increased turnout in elections, not just NZ. There was less than a 5% increase in voting in the last election despite it being a far more prominent election due to the kim dot com saga. National, our right wing party won so promisingly they were able to not form a coalition with other groups (this is almost unheard of in NZ). Many of my peers did not vote, nor did I as we believed that john key was a poor choice for a leader, but there was a lack of any leader that appealed to this group of 10 of us. We all agreed at the time that if there was a vote that had no significance in the election other than to measure those people who do not believe we have any valid current person running for prime minister we would not only have a higher turnout at the election with little effort, but we'd also have a better idea of what the general perception was on the stability of the political scene. This would help us to build a better political scene long term and involve the voter, ultimately resulting in higher voting turnout at a fraction of the cost or social effort and would result in a better turnout. This would theoretically apply globally too, as in countries such as the US it could be used to show many things, not just the (lack of) confidence in either leader, but also other things. I don't know any hurdles that would stop this from being non viable. Implementation might be a challenge but it could easily be overcome and the benefits would well outweigh the costs and implementation efforts | malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: College isn't for me. +
+ Help please change my view.
First off, here are my reasons:
1) It's too expensive. Many college graduates have a huge amount of student debt, and many students dropout because of financial problems.
2) I'm not smart. I'm a senior in high school. Actually a senior with junior credits. I'm missing 1.5 credits. 1.0 for math and 0.5 for Biology. I see college is for people who are lucky, smart, or rich. Most smart kids from my school were given scholarships because well... they were smart. The lucky few are people who are in sports and sometimes people like that little kid who went to McDonald's for some light to do his homework. And for the rich kids, obviously they have the money to get in there. From what I heard from other people, college won't take you if you're SATS aren't great or your GPA isn't up to par. I was really discouraged about that. Me unable to attend college because I'm not good at one subject.
3) A huge waste of time. Many jobs requires a minimum of a high school diploma. As I start researching the jobs that I wanted, I started to slowly realize that most of the job I need requires a college degree. I really wanted to take Filmmaking, but I heard rumors about why taking it isn't worth it. But that's a whole different story. And another one is, I wanted to be a cop. I heard from other people that in order to be a cop, you need a college degree. And as stated in reason 2, I don't think I'm able to go to college to be a cop or a filmmaker because I'm broke and "not smart".
I'm joining the Air Force, and I know the military can help you with education student loans and all that, but once I start thinking about it, it goes straight to reason 2. I'm plain out stupid. No matter how much time I spend studying math or being tutored, I can never get it. Math isn't for me.
Money and math is the only thing that is stopping me going to college. | resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: The George W. Bush years (2000-2008) will be perceived by future generations as a dark age in world history. +
+ If any of you frequent /r/badhistory, there is a rather infamous [chart](http://i.imgur.com/zbue8vU.jpg) that captures a popular perception of the Middle Ages as a "dark age" that retarded scientific progress by over 1,000 years. This perception is incorrect but is still commonplace. I believe that the Bush years will be viewed similarly by future generations for the following reasons:
The much disputed election in Florida was a huge challenge to the world's second-largest democracy. Having the Supreme Court effectively appoint a president upon party lines significantly hurt faith in the US political process and led to the polarization that has led to the Do-Nothing Congresses of 2006-2008 and 2010-.
Bush's decision to go to war in Iraq eroded the brief period of global consensus that saw countries from Iran to Russia united in sympathy with the USA against Al-Qaeda. I'm not saying we would be at world peace thereafter, but we could have taken advantage of that unity to seriously reduce international conflict.
Climate change. Need I say more? The Bush years saw inaction on global climate change that has endangered every country on earth.
Imperialism. The expansion of the War on Terror to Iraq and other groups was correlated with a rise of police militarization (in the US) and espionage (globally) and led to the installation of treasonous quisling governments around Europe.
Economic instability. The 2008 housing bubble (heavily concentrated in, you guessed it, Florida) triggered a global financial crisis that the world has yet to recover from. The progress that the world's 99%, overwhelmingly located in developing countries like China and India, made during the 2000s has almost completely been [reversed](http://blogs-images.forbes.com/timworstall/files/2015/01/oxfam1.jpg) by this fucking crisis. Global equity markets are now [as US-centric](http://www.marketwatch.com/story/heres-the-map-of-the-world-if-size-was-determined-by-market-cap-2015-08-12) as they've ever been since at least the Eighties, meaning that "the rise of the rest" has been an utter illusion.
Erosion in quality of living. In addition to the phony "development" of countries like China and India, Western countries have seen a large absolute drop in well-being due to the financial crisis of the Bush years, a drop which treaties like TPP and TTIP may well enshrine into law.
TL;DR: If the world is a dystopia in 2200, George W. Bush will be (rightfully or not) blamed.
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV:The popular reaction toward the Cecil lion incident was emotional and hypocritical +
+ First, I make the assumption that there is a very large intersection between people complaining about Cecil the lion's death, and people who eat meat. Given the prevalence of meat consumption in the U.S., and the popularity of the outrage toward the incident, I think this is a reasonable assumption. Keeping that in mind, here are my arguments, in order of importance.
**1)** Cecil was 13 years old. Males rarely even live to this age in the wild, so it was very likely that he would have soon been killed by another lion, had he been left alone. Therefore, the damage done to the species is negligible.
**2)** Meat production necessitates production of methane, which is [**25 times more more potent**](http://epa.gov/climatechange/ghgemissions/gases/ch4.html) than CO2 at warming the earth. Beef and lamb (and other ruminants) are **very** high producers of methane, and animal agriculture is responsible for 26% of methane emissions in the U.S.
Ruminant meat production (beef, lamb, bison, goat, etc.) also emits [an extremely large amount of CO2](http://www.theecologist.org/siteimage/scale/0/0/286401.jpg), which is the most familiar greenhouse gas in popular discourse. Even pork and chicken emit 6 and 3 times, respectively, as much CO2 as vegetarian protein options.
Meat is unnecessary for a healthy diet, and there's a lot of evidence that cutting out red meat (the meats which make up the lion's share, pun intended, of greenhouse gas emissions) is actually beneficial to human health. There's also growing evidence that methionine restriction is beneficial to humans. All animal proteins from mammals and birds are high in methionine, plant proteins are low in it.
By eating meat on a regular basis, particularly red meat, one directly exacerbates global warming, which would not only severely threaten the lion population, but also most complex life on earth.
**3)** Meat production also takes up far more space per calorie and per unit protein than plant production. This means that native wild fauna are prevented from returning to their natural habitat, and if demand for meat rises, that they are also further pushed out of any remaining habitat they have.
**4)** The dentist who shot the lion paid $50,000 to have that privilege. The GDP per head in Zimbabwe is about $950, so his actions put 50 people's annual salaries into the country.
**In summary:** The lion was old, and had little value to the species. Eating meat severely endangers all life on earth. Eating meat also means further destruction of wild animals' habitats for pasture land. The dentist also brought a large sum of money into the local economy in order to shoot the lion.
Therefore, anyone who is morally outraged about Cecil the lion's death and also eats meat regularly, particularly beef/lamb, is a hypocrite. Thus, the majority of the outrage comes from a place of emotion (discrimination), and is not morally justified.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: All atheists are agnostic by default +
+ There's a lot of people claiming to be agnostic atheists instead of atheists. This might have to do with the hateful and condescending views of the vocal minority of atheists. Atheists claim to be agnostic atheists, as if being an agnostic atheist is better than being an atheist.
However, I think most if not all atheists are agnostic. If we found undeniable evidence that God exists (e.g. He appears from the sky surrounded by golden light), then most atheists, agnostic or not, will believe that God exists. In other words, atheists don't believe in God simply because there isn't sufficient evidence. No one is saying with 100% certainty that God doesn't exist.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: i believe that Christian conservatives who oppose gay marriage are inconsistent in their desired application of the bible to law and politics +
+ I understand that the bible is pretty explicitly against gay marriage and behavior, and I get why religious conservatives might think to use the bible as justification to ban actions, behaviors, institutions, etc. that would not be banned on the basis of rational, secular reasoning alone (e.g. gay marriage, which does not seem to have any valid secular reasons to ban).
However, the bible is also explicitly against many things that I do not believe most religious conservatives want to ban. Most significantly, the [*very first commandment*](http://lifehopeandtruth.com/bible/10-commandments/the-ten-commandments/10-commandments-list/) states in no uncertain terms that it is against God's desires for God's people to have other gods. You might argue that this applies only to the Jews and descendants of those Jews who were saved from Egypt. But there are several [other verses](http://www.openbible.info/topics/false_gods) that forbid people from having other gods. Yet I don't see Christian conservatives rallying up, calling for the repeal of the 1st Amendment, and demanding a ban on Hinduism and other Polytheistic religons. Shouldn't "literally worshipping false gods" be *just as if not more* apalling to Christian conservatives as "Two men who love each other getting a marriage license"? Shouldn't there be just as much of an outcry from socially conservative Christians against the 1st Amendment's freedom of religion clause (which allows Hindus and others to worship "false" gods) as there is against legalized gay marriage? It seems to me to be a very inconsistent view of the bible's tenets in forming political opinions.
(Resubmitted as the previous post had a typo in the title)
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Video games built around addiction by investment are immoral. +
+ I believe that video games that are designed from the ground up to retain players by constantly reminding them of the time they've already invested in the game are immoral, regardless of the actual quality of the game otherwise. For my argument, I have three major examples: World of Warcraft, League of Legends, and Clash of Clans. These may not be the worst offenders or even the best examples, but they are the ones that I have the most personal experience with and thus feel like I am most able to discuss.
World of Warcraft has often received flak for its addictive properties by way of grinding. The player is led into a repetitive cycle of doing the same or similar things over and over again to slowly improve their character or extensions of their character. This is often cited as the core reason that World of Warcraft and other MMO's are so addictive, but I believe that another reason that often goes unnoticed is how attached players get to their investment of time. Players who may not gain much actual enjoyment out of the game anymore continue to play because they feel that if they stop playing that the countless hours that they've sunk into the game have been for nothing. This is doubly emphasized by the monthly subscription fee, where players considering quitting the game will consider not just the time they've invested, but also the money. The longer they've played, the more money they've "wasted" if they stop.
League of Legends follows very similar principles. Even if the core game itself is well-designed and fun in its own right, the fact that the game is still built around an investment damns it all the same. Players who get hooked on the gameplay will accumulate points that they can use to unlock new characters and different gameplay-adjusting tools. Eventually they will probably spend money on the game to either unlock and new character faster or to purchase a cosmetic skin for a character that they particularly enjoy. So now they've been put in the same situation. Even if they start to get bored with the game, many people will continue to play because of how much time and usually money that they've invested into the game. If they quit, it's not just the knowledge and skills they've developed that are going to waste, but also all the time and money they've devoted to unlocking things within the game.
And of course if you've followed this far, you probably know where I'm going with Clash of Clans. Mobile games in general seem to have taken this principle to an extreme. In Clash of Clans not only are you constantly trying to improve your base and troops, but you are constantly seeing other people's bases which motivates the player in two different ways: one by showing them better bases, which they envy, and two by showing them worse bases, to remind them of how far they've come. And there the same principle comes to play. Players don't want to stop playing because they are constantly reminded of how much time (and, again, possibly money) that they've already invested and they don't want to "waste" it by quitting.
Why I think this is immoral should be, I hope, obvious. Players who no longer enjoy a game are psychologically manipulated into continuing to play, and the longer they play, the harder it is for them to stop. But what makes it even worse is the social aspect of it. All the aforementioned game are also very social games where players are encouraged to "show off" what they've earned or bought. This gives positive feedback on their investment and makes the addiction that much stronger. And as I touched on with the Clash of Clans paragraph, this effect hits twice as players with less who are shown off to are likely to be envious and be motivated to be trapped in the same investment addiction that the show offs are trapped in. Of course, much of that is human nature, but that makes taking advantage of it, especially in such refined and systematic ways, no less immoral.
Please challenge my view.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV:Marijuana should be legal in all forms, for both recreational and medical use +
+ I believe that Marijuana is a very beneficial plant that has a myriad of medical uses, and i also believe that it is possible to use marijuana for recreation and lead a healthy, productive lifestyle. Not all people who smoke are lazy stoners, some people are very active, healthy people who like to smoke marijuana responsibly just like they would have a glass of wine. I see no problem with relaxing at the end of the day.
Obviously minors should not be allowed to use or possess the plant, but is there something i'm overlooking in my philosophy? Are there any real cons to Marijuana legalization? It provides millions of tax revenue, which leads to infrastructure improvement among other things. It also leads to tax rebates for the citizens, which Colorado did because they had too much tax money. But, most of all it eliminates the possibility to be locked up for relaxing at the end of the day. | resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: I shouldn't Vote +
+ I just moved from New Hampshire's first District, a district that has gone GOP ('04)-Dem ('06)-Dem ('08)-GOP ('10)-Dem ('12)-GOP ('14) (fun fact, between 2006 and now, its ping-ponged between two people, Carol Shea-Porter and the somewhat corrupt Frank Guina). NH on a Federal level is a Purple-lean Dem state, with one senator from each party, and one rep from each party. On the State level, we have a Dem Gov, a GOP Executive Council, a massively GOP General Court. My town sent two GOP reps, but the town next door sent 5 Dem reps.
But
I live in Georgia now. I live in Forsyth County, north of Fulton County (Atlanta). My house is represented by all republicans, state house, state senate, federal house, federal senate, governor etc and Forsyth went ~75% for Romney in 2012. A far cry from NH.
Now, I am a person who leans republican, so at this point, I see nothing wrong with my current representation, but I see no reason why I should vote. Nothing will change, I still will be represented by Republicans, and Georgia will still go to the Republican in 2016.
Some may argue that if I don't vote I can't complain. Thats just a stupid argument because then over 60% of the nation "can't complain"
So, change my view, why should I vote?
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Female Virginity is a big deal +
+ Hi, i am a 22 years old agnostic living in a conservative Muslim country that is considered a bit modern and open mind compared to other Muslim countries (Tunisia), i've said that so you know that my opinion is not based on religious rules, however it heavily depends on cultural traditions and moral codes that has been implemented into my way of thinking since i pop-up into this world (yeah that sounds a lot like a religion, it just doesn't include an invisible overpowered sky-man)
Anyway, i'll try to keep this as short as possible and sum up my view toward this subject.
In our culture, a successful person is one who has a successful family, that include having a good job, good wife/husband a decent house and if you're good enough you'll have your own house and a car (yup, that's the dream of 90% of people here) so being raised with that goal in mind, anything that you do that could be considered a threat to that goal is considered **super bad** one of these many things is non-virgin girls, to be more precise, girls who lost their virginity in a non-marital relationship, these women are considered a no-no for marriage and the main two reasons here are religion and men's ego (i honestly believe that religion is made of men's ego so there is only one reason here...) anyway, so far i've been only talking about rules made by invisible people and what men wants, i completely ignored the women perspective here and the fact that this is their body, their choice and they can do whatever they want to, and am okay with that! i won't condemn a girl just because she slept with some guy and stone her to death, i won't even look down at her, but i can **never** imagine myself marrying her, why? because i cannot stand the fact that someday, someone, could look at me and say:
That's not cool bro, it's very embarrassing, and yup, the counter-argument for this would be :
well, i don't want anybody to fuck my partner o_O !! even in the past when we didn't even knew each other, that's my view on this.
Also, another argument that i would like to hear your opinion about is that i don't want to live in a society where kids are having sex, no offense but, [16 and pregnant](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/16_and_Pregnant) has 5 seasons! and i read all the time about 12,13,14,15 years old kids having sex, and i believe the reason this is happening is due to this "openness" that western countries have about sex and that's why this kind of things is very rare in a conservative society, this is the only positive point that i can come up with regarding my view on the subject, the rest is like i said, a pure ego of a selfish men dominant society, but if it protect our kids, i think it's worth it, it's also the reason of a an ultimate boring amateur sex life which is the main reason of cheating and divorce but that's an after-marriage subject lol.
So, western men (or anyone who is okay with non-virgin wives) how can you change my view on this ?
It seems that i missed a point that come up to many of you here :
Yes, ideally a man should stay virgin too, and from a religious perspective he'll had the same punishment as the women which is 100 lash, no idea where the stoning come from but again ignore the religion crap and no none of this happen in my country/culture, however, due to other facts like men are more likely the ones who had the job and the money, and that men are the one who have the option to "look out" for their future wives, this will make women more vulnerable to this virginity rules, since they are the one who wait and just decide to say yes or no, while men have the "option" to choose, which make the pre-marriage sex "sin" for men a lot less important compared to women, and of course you cannot ignore the "physical evidence", since we are far from living in an ideal world, a man could have sex as much as he want and just lie about it, while a woman cannot do that (well she can but most of the time they cannot)
Sorry but i missed another points :
Well, i think it's all related to that "life goal", if a girl (or man) take the risk of threatening that goal by having sex then they are simply considered bad people, and no one would like to marry a bad person (i have no idea about forgiveness option though).
I personally have zero problem with that, but i think it's also a no-no thing in this culture.
Thanks
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: I believe in complete bodily autonomy +
+ So long as a person is mentally sound and not infringing upon the rights of others, they should be able to do as they please to their own body. Body modification (tattoos, piercings, plastic surgery), abortion, suicide, drug use, you name it. If I want to burn my brain on exstacy and I'm not robbing anyone for cash or injuring anyone while intoxicated, go me. If I want breasts the size of watermelons, woohoo. If I simply do not wish to live on this planet, that's up to me to bury a bullet in my skull. If any of these things end up being a mistake, they are my mistake to make and the government should have no say in whether or not I can commit them. | resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: I feel homophobia is a symptom of more deeply entrenched personal traits, and feel uncomfortable around ex-homophobes due to assuming these traits still exist. +
+ As a gay man, I can be extremely wary of other people for my own protection. I've always felt that homophobia is mainly a symptom of the willingness to hate other groups of people they have never met or gotten to know. Thus when I hear someone say "I used to be homophobic until [insert "my son came out," or "my friend came out" or etc.]" I assume they still are willing to hate groups of people they haven't met, it's just now that they know a gay person "gay people" no longer fall under that category.
While I am outwardly supportive when I run into these folks, inwardly I am uncomfortable to the point of being repulsed. Obviously it wouldn't be good to push for gay rights and then effectively punish homophobes for changing their minds towards being supportive, but it's hard to think in any way besides "these people are still severely prejudiced or hateful, just not specifically towards me anymore, avoid avoid avoid!" Please CMV!
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: I believe that sports stadiums are a net negative for their local communities/municipalities, and that this inhibits cities from focusing on things like public works, transportation, and education +
+ Here are a few sources:
http://www.brookings.edu/research/articles/1997/06/summer-taxes-noll
http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/09/if-you-build-it-they-might-not-come-the-risky-economics-of-sports-stadiums/260900/
The sources that I am citing are really only on the TEI of the stadium itself, but I also posit that this prevents cities from using resources on things that are arguably more valuable and essential to the city and to society.
Perhaps, previously when stadiums were multipurpose the TEI was more impactful but today, it seems like there is bad deal after bad deal like Miami's stadium and potentially the proposed stadium in STL.
I'm a fan of pro sports, but this concerns me. Please CMV. | resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: I see no rational argument in favor of the Consumer Product Safety Commission's ban on magnets +
+ In 2009, a company began producing a desktop novelty called Buckyballs, that consisted of a bunch of small spherical magnets. Users could use these magnets to create shapes by pulling the magnets apart and rearranging them in different ways.
Over the first few years, some of the magnets fell into the hands of children who swallowed them. Doctors found that if a child swallowed more than one at different times, the magnets would be attracted to each other and cause a myriad of internal injuries. According to a 2012 article on [Huffington Post](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/eliyahu-federman/banning-buckyball-magnets_b_1711110.html), 22 children were injured, but no fatalities were reported.
In July of 2012, the CPSC filed a lawsuit against one company. Their demands were as follows (paraphrased for brevity):
1. Cease Importation and Distribution of the product.
2. Notify all persons that handle the product to cease immediately distribution of the product.
3. Notify state and local public health of the dangers.
4. Notify the public, any third party sellers, on radio, television, in English and other languages about the dangers of the product.
5. Notify every distributor and every person who knows such a product was delivered or sold.
6. Refund all money to purchasers.
7. Refund all expenses of retailers associated with the recall.
8. Report and keep records of all of the above for five years and report to the commission monthly on the progress.
In my view, this is irrational and an obscene waste of resources. Not to mention a clear and deliberate attempt to utterly destroy a legally operating business. The only justification is that swallowing the items can hurt you (which could be said for literally millions of other commercially produced items)
The final ruling bans **ALL** magnets that fit into the CPSC small parts cylinder sold for entertainment as part of a set or as a set and has a magnetic flux of 50 kG2 mm2 or stronger.
What possible societal benefit could result from this that outweighs the cost associated with this action?
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: While white people will never be able to understand what it means to be a minority, that doesn't mean we cannot be critical of their actions. +
+ I recently got in an argument with a friend regarding the BLM (Black Lives Matter) interruption of Bernie Sanders speech. I argued that while I understand their frustration, I still hold its unacceptable to break the law the way BLM did.
My friend argued back that since both of us are white, we can never understand the situation and the anger these representatives of BLM feel. Therefore, she argued, we cannot criticize their actions since we cannot and can never understand their perspective.
My friend showed me [this article](http://time.com/3605606/ferguson-in-defense-of-rioting/) in defense of her argument. I'll quote from the conclusion,
In response to the article, I essentially argued that while I do feel for minorities in the U.S, violence is neither a morally sound or pragmatic way to go about change. I also felt that the argument presented (we are not minorities, therefore we will never be able to understand, therefore we cannot criticize) is fundamentally unsound.
I'd love to hear some support for her viewpoint, because I am an open-minded person and I care about racial equality America
So please, CMV!
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Body cams on police are a bad idea. +
+ Part of my opinion is shaped by the fact that I have been on the wrong end of the law. I don't believe the police should have the right to film me at all, unless they already have probable cause to suspect me of a crime.
I believe that the use of bodycams will increase the number of people charged and convicted of minor drug offenses. It will also increase the amount of evidence used against people in court, regardless of whether or not the laws involved are correct or just (I am especially talking about minor drug offenses and other victimless crimes).
I think it's necessary to have checks on the police and prevent police brutality and abuse. But I think the number of new people convicted with evidence from bodycams will outweigh the benefits. Also, I don't think it's fair that the police are allowed to film citizens without probable cause if citizens are not allowed to freely film the police as well. Basically I think the police actually like having bodycams, as it will increase the conviction rate. If we want to keep our eyes on the police and prevent brutality, citizens should be able to freely film and record their police and traffic stops.
Body cams will do more harm than good.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV : State and parents supporting children until 18 years is insufficient - it should provide indefinitely +
+ In my opinion since a person has no say to being born into existence or not , his parents and state should provide means to continue that existence. If the individual has motivation to provide for himself this should be viewed as optional and not the default scenario. Simply put i am not responsible for having no motivation to provide for myself and since i'm born this way and i had no say into being born at at all - such state that allows my parents to have children should be held accountable. It is not individual who should be shamed for entitlement and being called lazy , it is state who should be shamed for entitlement and if parents can't entertain the idea that their children would not be intested in providing for themselves should have no entitlement for having them | resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: ALL party consent rule for phone recording should be abolished in ALL STATES of US and one party consent rule should be legislated. +
+ As you might be aware, several states in US has this notorious ALL PARTY CONSENT law, which requires consent of both parties on a phone call to record conversation. I find this law arbitrary and I present several points to support my notion.
- First of all, there should be no additional expectation of privacy for phone calls, as much as privacy you get during written communication. Every written communication, be it Instant messaging, email or plain old snail mail is in documentary form. If someone states something on regular mail and then differs from their statement, you can always show the document as evidence. This is not possible in case of phone call, as it is audible way of communication, in which sound cease to exist as soon as you hear it. So, no evidence can be held except from recording it.
- A conversation recording can be helpful in multiple scenarios. It's benefits outweigh its drawbacks. Think of it. A promise to pay money on phone. A threat to any crime on phone. A statement made by your boss against company policy or just a demand of bribe from a corrupt officials.
- In Majority of cases, phone recording isn't broadcast in public by recorder. It is used only for specific purpose.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: The Palestinians had the moral high ground (or at least parity) for statehood back in 1948, but have since lost it after decades of terrorism fueled by antisemitism. +
+ 1. Israel has repeatedly been on the defense in wars with her neighbors, only making aggressive maneuvers after repelling the invaders. Israel has usally given most of the captured land back to the aggressors as a olive branch in good faith
2. Israel treats her Palestinian citizens has full citizens, even holding public office. Religious freedom is the standard, as are most civil liberties expected of a civilized liberal democracy in the 21st century.
3. Israel exercises an extraordinary effort and restraint when engaging Palestinian terrorists in combat by warning innocents to leave an area they are about to bomb. It is impossible to avoid all civilian deaths, but at least they seriously try.
4. In contrast, Palestinians, namely Hamas are foundationally (in their founding charter) committed to killing as many Jews and Israelis as they can, at any cost, as seen by their relentless attack on southern Israel with rockets and raids.
5. Hamas also intentionally uses their citizens as human shields by building their military facilities under hospitals and kindergartens. Even going to the extent of forcing civilians into buildings that they know are about to be bombed to as to increase the casualties for PR reasons.
6. Palestinians have repeatedly, under multiple governments, refused to even consider a peaceful coexistence with Israel. This is seen by the Palestinians consistently refusing to even consider favorable peace terms offered by the Israelis.
I mean even if they got the short end of the stick 70 years ago, that can only excuse being so shitty for so long, right?
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: It doesn't matter who becomes the next President. +
+ Been following the political news and had a few thoughts. It really wouldn't matter for the nation who becomes the next President. It seems like the era of great presidents (Lincoln, FRD, Teddy Roosevelt), who can truly make significant changes, have long past.
All of the current candidates, both Democrats and Republicans, more or less qualify to run a gov't, except probably Dr. Carson. Many of them have held high government positions (governors, senators) or high-ranking business positions (CEO's). They would know what to do as a President.
All of the important gov't positions are filled with appointed candidates (The Cabinet, Joint Chiefs, Fed Chairman, SC Justices and etc), who are typically chosen based on their actual abilities and not on their likability to the masses.
For example, say something happens to Obama and he can no longer be a president. Would anything drastic happen in the gov't? Not really, Biden would become president and business would go on as usual.
Thus whether it's the populist Sanders, the clown Trump, the crazy Cruz, the young Rubio, the old lady Clinton or the libertarian Paul, nothing spectacular or drastic would come. The nation would run its course, governed by the well established system, and not by individual people.
**The discussion is whether or not the next President, Democrat or Republican, is capable of bringing truly significant reforms, changing the course of the entire nation. It doesn't matter if these changes go along with Republican or Democratic party lines.**
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Eating meat is murder and as long as I do that I can't call anyone out for doing anything immoral +
+ Animals are living beings able to feel suffering just like humans. Because of this humans and animals are equal and should be treated the same. Humans don't have to eat meat. If I eat meat I support the murder and suffering off these animals, which makes me pro-murder. Just because I feel more of a "connection" to humans because they're the same kind of animal as I am doesn't mean that it's right to kill those that I don't feel a connection with, because as I said, they are able to feel suffering, and that's what counts.
Being pro-murder of living beings being able to feel pain is basically on the bottom of the moral list. Murder is the worst thing anyone can do to another living being. My moral is already so bad, who am I to say people can't be racist? Who am I to say people can't rape? I am pro-murder for gods sake, these things aren't as bad as murder. Sure, these people I'm calling out are maybe meateaters (pro-murder) AND racists (like it would make any difference), but since I'm pro-murder myself who am I really to say anything, c'mon? Plus these rapists could be vegan which makes them a better person than I am since rape is not as bad as murder. I shouldn't even call people out for murdering human beings.
Could someone please change my view on this, it is messing with my head so much. I feel like I can never call out anyone for having bad morals, or even causing extreme physical/mental pain or death to human beings because I am pro-murder of living beings being able to feel suffering myself as long as I eat meat.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Only cisgender exists +
+ I'd like to start this by clearly defining my position:
I think only cisgender, and by that I mean identifying with the gender you are born with, is a valid gender identification. I don't know if valid is the right world but it's the only one that sounds appropriate. Essentially, I think gender and biological sex are one and the same, gender is just a social construct to express our biological sex.
In every animal in nature we can find two sexes, male and female. Sometimes the sexes have similar roles, sometimes the male or the female has more important roles, it doesn't matter - It's there, and it's happening in nature. I'm not making an appeal to nature as a form of fallacy, I'm merely pointing out that it's a special pleading fallacy to think humans are special because we can get away with ignoring our biological sex. I admit that Humans have less sexual dimorphism than other animals and namely we can find, aside from physical and procreation capacities, little differences between men and women because both are capable of amazing things. I'm ok with abolishing or ignoring gender roles and allowing boys and girls to play with what they want. What we can't do is to pretend that we can magically change the sex we are born into.
To use an analogy, if I decided to transplant my nose and put some whiskers and called myself a tiger, would I be a tiger or just a nutjob? What would you consider me?
The primary argument for transgenderism is that gender dysphoria makes people feel bad about the biological sex they are born with or the gender they were assigned at birth, and therefore they have the right to identify with what makes them more comfortable. This sounds nice and reasonable, but the issue is that thinking we are something does not make us that something. I can imagine I'm a dragon in my head but that doesn't change the fact dragons don't exist and I'm still Human.
To categorize and simplify arguments:
1 - Every or most species have a male and female specimen and, regardless of what roles each one has, to think Humans are different is a special pleading, kinda like thinking Humans will forever be the best species on the universe
2 - The fact someone's brain tells them something is wrong or better doesn't mean it's true. If your brain can identify as a genderqueer or genderneutral, I don't see how I can't identify as a rock or a dragon. Why is the latter less valid? The fact the brain identifies as such doesn't mean we are such, it's irrelevant. If you are born with a penis, you are a man and if you are born with a vagina, you are a woman. There are obvious biological features specially related to procreation and body shape. Some transgender people, even those who have surgery, will forever look similar to the gender they don't want to be associated it, it's inevitable. The fact I want to change my deepest self doesn't mean I am actually doing it.
3 - Why is gender special? In short, why can't I magically change other things about myself? I look white, and I know race is a social construct - It's still a useful concept to categorize us - Why can't I identify as black even with pale skin? Why can't a redhead identify as a black hair? Why can't children identify as adults, etc.? Again, special pleading.
Oh, I also think the word cisgender shouldn't even be used.
Some notes:
- I am not promoting violence and hate against transgender people. If I meet someone who is trans, I will treat them like I treat anyone else. I can disagree with the core idea without hating the person.
- Don't bring up analogies to gay people and gay marriage because both are incomparable and completely different topics.
- Don't use "you're a bigot" as an argument
- My arguments have nothing to do with religion, I'm an atheist. | resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Prostitution should be legalized, I don't feel most arguments against it hold water. +
+ I've been thinking about this one for a while. While a lot of the arguments for it ("It's the oldest profession"; "we should have full rights to our bodies") don't hold up too well, neither do a lot of the arguments against it. **(As a side note, I'll be referring to women but all these arguments could reliably be applied to male prostitutes for the most part)**
One of the most oft-touted arguments that I seem to see is that "Women will be forced into prostitution because they have no other options".
I fail to see this as a legitimate concern. Not because I don't think some women would choose prostitution to survive (it would happen, undoubtedly) but because I don't see how this is a bad thing. If the woman's only option was prostitution, and you take that away, what is her option now? Starvation? Homelessness? While it might cause mental damage to a woman to be forced into sex, as long as it's legal, enforced, and safe, isn't the damage likely to be far less than the mental *and* physical damage she'd suffer being unemployed/watching her children and herself starve/living out on the streets/whatever else she needed the funds for?
If I argued that minimum wage jobs should be illegalized because "Desperate people might feel obligated to work them", would that make sense? I don't think so. A McJob is a McJob, and a McBlowjob can still be a job without being intrinsically damaging to a person. One could argue that sex is still somewhat taboo, especially with strangers, and that the cultural ramifications cause shame, stress, and mental damage, but that's a part of society's problem with sex, not a problem with prostitution itself. The only argument I could think of is that a woman might be forced to give up her virginity to work, which I concede is awful and should never happen, but often does even with it illegal and if virginity and morality is the only thing standing between eating and starvation, I'm reasonably certain illegality is not going to stop many/any women.
I think a regulated, safe, and well-operated system of brothels (and only brothels, to ensure there are no dangers to streetwalkers/regulations can be easily enforced) would reduce the amount of dangers as well as offer additional opportunities. To clarify, this system would involve:
(Actually, that last one would be good with or without legalized, but whatever).
**What I'd like to see to Change My View (in addition to any logical moral/emotional arguments):**
-Studies on legalization that prove it's not safe/causes societal repercussions more severe than the benefits.
-Studies on lack of effects (or worsening) of street prostitutes/pimp culture.
-Anything else relevant to disprove anything I've said here.
**What I would not like to see:**
-Outright moral arguments ("Selling your body is wrong", anonymous/casual sex is a sin)
-Any arguments I listed above without additions ("Women will be forced into sex slavery")
-Religious arguments
Thanks for your time :3
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV:Racism, sexism and general discrimination will only begin to fade when we stop pointing fingers and accept that "Us" vs "Them" isn't real, there is only "Us" on this earth. +
+ It's a fairly accepted fact that humans are social creatures and like to form groups. This can have positive effects like a sense of belonging, cooperation and division of burdens. However, to make a group, each member has to have something in common, other than just being human. It could be gender, race, a common vision or belief. You get the idea.
So by uniting based on common characteristics, we automatically exclude those who don't fit the mould. Thus creating every kind of discrimination you can think of.
The worst part is, if you look at groups of people looking to reduce discrimination, they're as much as part of the problem as the original perpetrators. One example of this in action is the reporter who was kicked out of a Black Lives event in CSU. African Americans have a long history of mistreatment in the US and many have the right to be furious. But the problem is that they see all "whites" as being the perpetrators of this mistreatment and exacerbate the "white vs black" dichotomy.
My opinion on how to solve these issues is this: I've been told that to solve problems as a couple, you mustn't make it "you" vs "partner", you have to make it "both of you as a couple" vs "the problem". So I think we should apply the same logic to racism and sexism. Women vs men and whites vs blacks (only two of the uncountable amount of dichotomies that exist) can't be solved by separating and pointing fingers at the other group, it can only be solved by uniting. There is no Us vs Them, only Us.
Perhaps you've suffered discrimination first hand (as I have) and disagree with my opinion because you want justice above all. In which case, please explain your opinion.
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Reddit content is dying. +
+ (context) I just posted a question seeking opinions about the isrealo-palestinian conflict, and what we can do to help and I'm getting jokes as answers on /r/askreddit. Now I don't want to generalize by saying reddit is becoming stupider but even when I'm obviously being serious about a subject, Poe's law still applies.
I'm losing faith in reddit and this once beautiful platform for change is degrading into a meme clusterfuck devoid of any intellect. Only a few select highly controversial posts make it to the front line, intelligent discussion is harder and harder to find. This community has so much potential but it looks like it's being run by /r/circlejerk.
View changed/abandonning thread, too subjective, I just feel like we're not optimizing this beautiful site and that popularity trumps good content all the time. This website could be revolutionary if it was used for more, you know? anyway, had a blast talking with you and learned a lot.
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: The idea that homeschoolers are missing out on "socialization" is a myth in that the socialization that happens in public schools is almost entirely negative and not applicable to the real world. +
+ To save time, let's just focus on the social quality of public schools from **middle school forward**. Let's also not get into the argument of whether and how kids who are homeschooled are socialized outside of school, but you can't bring up as a benefit to school a type of socialization that isn't unique to school.
What I'm proposing is that having been through public school myself and watching what has happened to all my friend's teenagers who went to public school for middle and high school, I have seen each become more vain, more sexual, more concerned about their self image, more critical of themselves and others, and other negative traits (basically Jerry Springer TV show hopefuls). Schools can't/won't reign in the mocking and bullying and despite what some people claim, I don't believe there's value in being bullied for years without anyone coming to your aid. | resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: People who say victims of suicide are selfish are the ones who are actually selfish +
+ My logic is pretty simple. People who believe that someone is selfish for committing or wanting to commit suicide just because it makes those around them sad then they are actually the ones who are selfish because they'd rather someone suffer than have them end their misery and be forced to grieve their death. I think there are instances where suicide is selfish (people who have children that still rely on them) but if you have no responsibilities such as that then it could be your reasons are actually very selfless. Furthermore I think that calling people who struggle with suicidal thoughts "selfish" is extremely insensitive and misguided as I'd tend to believe that most people who off themselves are doing it for reasons they perceive to be for the greater good. CMV! | malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Rape on college campuses is not as big of a problem as it's made out to be. +
+ So that's a pretty bold title, and I expect to get harassed, doxxed, etc which is why I made a throwaway. I'm just asking that you remain civil. As much as I try I just can't understand the other side of this argument.
Basically, I believe that rape is not a big problem on college campuses, the real problem is that no one agrees as to what consent is anymore. What sparked this was the recent news story:
http://www.thecollegefix.com/post/23709/
In this story, the woman has sex with the man, then sees him kissing another woman and decides that she was raped. It is mentioned that the woman attended a lecture where the speaker (a college administrator) said that regretting a sexual encounter means that you were raped. I think that this is a horrible definition of rape and it hurts both men and women.
Then there is the mattress girl story and the Duke lacrosse story and the Rolling Stone story, all of which were big name rape cases, all of which turned out to be false accusations.
Why does this keep happening? I believe that a large part of it is that people are operating under sexist definitions of consent and rape.
If a man and woman both get drunk and have sex, the woman can claim rape and it's all the guys fault.
If a man and woman have sex and the woman later regrets it, the woman can claim rape and it's all the guys fault.
If a man and woman have sex and the woman later is angry and wants to get revenge, the woman can claim rape and it's all the guys fault.
None of these situations are rape, but nonetheless, men have been punished for these exact situations.
In short, I believe that women are now taught to believe that if they have any regret about a sexual encounter, then it is rape. Other women have come to see that false rape claims are a powerful weapon. These cases inflate the college rape statistics. It is impossible for a man to have a one-night stand anymore without fear of being dragged through the mud and having his life ruined.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: College Tuition should not be completely government subsidized +
+ So, I'm writing this as an American, and one of the big crux points of Bernie Sander's policy is fully subsidizing college with government funds. I really think that's a bad for a few reasons.
1. There are a ton of jobs that already require college degrees that frankly probably shouldn't. You don't even need a degree in the same field as what you're doing sometimes, they just want 'a degree.' This would instead put the burden of a nearly useless degree on the community, instead of the individual. Why should I be helping pay for someone who majored in one thing only to go work somewhere completely different?
2. There are already government subsidized educations, such as federal service academies, ROTC programs, some doctors/lawyers that get picked up by the military, among other programs. They get their education paid for in return for service to the government. This makes sense to me, the government is getting people who are educated in a specific way that they need in return for paying for their education. You couldn't feasibly employ this type of program over the whole country because some people want to take degrees in something the government has no use for.
3. This is essentially making college degrees completely necessary. It would be nearly free, or so cheap that almost everyone can afford it, even though some people are not going to be able to hack it. College is not for everyone, it's meant to push your boundaries and really develop critical thinking skills. What do you do for the people who are not capable of receiving a college degree? What if they go, and flunk out? Does the government still foot that bill? That would be a waste of money. Would they be forced to pay it back? That's penalizing someone who already is going to have a tough time making money.
I am in favor of fixing how the system works. People who get a degree, and are successful (which isn't everyone) still have years and years of huge debts to pay off. We need to figure out a way to cap those debts off, make it more affordable. Not every college degree makes a ton of money, particularly some professions where a college degree is very necessary, so we need to work on that. I just really don't think a full subsidy is the wrong move.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Any life other than one of poverty is unethical. +
+ Lets start by looking at a situation:
Imagine you are walking by a shallow river on your way to a ball when you see a child drowning. You're wearing some pretty expensive clothes (lets say 500 pounds) that will no doubt be ruined if you jump into the river. Saving this child doesn't put you in danger as you can stand in this river while the child being smaller cannot. Do you jump into that river to save that child?
Let's say you encounter that same river with a different child in it the next day while wearing your rolex watch. Do you jump into that river to save the child?
Now lets look at the real world. More than 1.3 billion people live in extreme poverty (less than 80p a day) and 7.6 million children are estimated to have died before their 5th birthday in 2010. Many of these are from poverty, preventable diseases and illnesses. Money can help provide infrastructure for schools, hospitals, sanitation facilities, vaccinations etc which no doubt will help reduce child mortality rates. Once you look at the world through this lens then it is easy enough to look at the world in terms of opportunity cost. This iphone or 100 life saving vaccinations. An expensive house or cheap government housing and a new well providing water for a village. One may argue that there is a difference between the example and this and that is distance. These children are much further away but I don't see how that dilutes your moral responsibility to them. Therefore, it seems that any money that you keep must be worth a child's life, education etc or be allocated to some other duty such as child rearing where you have a responsibility to give time and money (for schools, healthcare etc) to make sure that your child grows up to be a socially productive member of society. I know that sounds like a very cold perspective on what parenting is about but i couldn't think of another way to phrase it haha.
I will assume that most people think that you should save the child but this specifically is why I would save the child. I'm looking at this from the stance of virtue ethics (Aquinas) and I believe that by allowing this child to die shows a lack of charity and isn't positively building character. I can't justify losing a life in exchange for 500 pounds.
But, I think even taken from the stance of consequentialism (believing that consequences should inform your moral thinking) or deontological ethics (believing that laws inform your moral stance) you would still reach the eventual conclusion that you must jump into that river:
Consequentialism (i.e. Utilitarianism):
You would have to argue that having 500 pounds will lead to greater pleasure/happiness than that life and I don't think you can justify that.
Deontological ethics (i.e. Kant):
I only really understand Kant so he's the one that I will briefly (very briefly) talk about but allowing that child to die breaks the categorical imperative as if you allowed that act to become universal you would be devaluing human life by saying that it has a price tag.
I've only briefly talked about why I think the child should be saved as I take it as a assumption that most people would save the child but I will be willing to discuss my ethical stance more thoroughly if anyone asks me about it but i didn't want my post to only appeal to those who have studied philosophy.
Thanks for your answers!
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Strip clubs are a waste of time and money. +
+ Let's say your friend comes up to you one day and suggests you come to this unique restaurant with him, one where all the food is lavishly and decoratively displayed to make sure that it looks and smells as delicious and mouthwatering as possible. However you're not allowed to actually touch or eat it, and in fact there's no eating allowed whatsoever in the restaurant, no eating the food on display and definitely nothing you brought in. And your friend insists that this restaurant is really special because if you pay extra -about the price you'd pay for a pretty nice meal elsewhere- they'll bring you to a private table and bring you the dishes you think look and smell the tastiest. And they'll arrange them right in front of you in gorgeous arrays, and you can maybe play with it a bit. Stir or move it around with your fork or spoon, handle the dishes themselves a bit, and -this is why it's a *really* special version of these restaurants- you can even taste it a bit, swish the drinks around in your mouth a little. But still absolutely no eating the food whatsoever.
So at the end of the day you're absolutely starving after paying some good money for the experience of being teased with some delicious looking food for an hour or so, and now you've got to go home to eat whatever lacklustre stuff you've got in the kitchen or go to another restaurant where you can actually buy something to eat.
If your friend said you should go to this restaurant you'd think they were retarded. But if you don't want to go get blueballed at a strip club for an hour or so, for some reason you're the weird one.
So I don't get strip clubs, they seem like a complete waste of money and time. CMV. | resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: GMOs are necessary, efficient, and safe. Monsanto is not an "evil" corporation, despite the Agent Orange days. +
+ I used to be very pro-organic when I was a younger lad, but when I saw an episode of Penn & Teller's show, "Bullshit!", debunking the myths about GMOs, I couldn't help but look more into it and reform my views towards the ones that conform more with the scientific consensus of being pro-GMO. I have no issues with others, or even me, eating organic; And I'm even open to food labeling. But what I want to get out of this are legitimate, fact-based arguments detailing the ills of the biotech-industry and their relevant GMO-related products (such as crops, Bt toxin plants, Glyphosate, etc). I am already aware of the eradication of milkweeds due to Glyphosate, thus plunging the Monarch population, but there are solutions being made around the issue that won't hinder biotechnology, while benefiting the butterflies. If you have arguments akin to that, I hope you can provide a hypothetical solution that would substantiate your argument. I don't predict my views to change significantly, but I am open to it being so. If anything, I anticipate at most getting to some gray-scale, though it may just be me greatly underestimating the organic-movement.
Please no Natural News, Infowars, Mind Unleashed, GreenMedInfo, etc. If you do use those kinds of websites as a source, please justify why you are, because as far as I'm concerned, they are potent fact-manipulators who don't care about the truth, but cognitive dissonance. | resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: As a Vietnamese, sometimes I wish the America won the Vietnam War +
+ Look, I know this is a touchy subject, and while people might say I'm young and didn't understand the complexity of wars, just hear me out.
Vietnam was essentially a communist state, due to influences from China and USSR, which were alliances (the former is debatable) of Vietnam during the war. After the war, our country has suffered multiple economic depressions, and famines due to the incompetence of our liberally named Communist Party. Granted the South Vietnam government wasn't any better, but what the U.S wanted for Vietnam was for the best.
I understand that, technically the US did not wage war with our people, but stood against the spread of communism in Asia, and with our strategic location, a battle surely followed. The US did not deliberately invaded our country. And look at what they did to the world. ~~Defeated the Nazis and fascist countries~~, uplifted South Korea, Japan (which were both smaller and less resourceful than my country) to their respectable position on the world map today. And what had the sole communist party in my country done? Nothing but left our people in the struggle of a third-world country. And China is still brazenly harassing our borders and seas to this very day, just because our army is incapable of standing up for themselves.
~~Please tell me if I was wrong and why the North won was a good idea.~~
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: A government-only backdoor into encryption is impossible. +
+ So the FBI and other law enforcement agencies have been vocally asking for software companies to be required to [introduce backdoors into their encryption](http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2015/07/08/421251662/fbi-director-says-agents-need-access-to-encrypted-data-to-preserve-public-safety) so that warrants can be served.
From what I've read, this is not technically possible, or at least it's not technically possible to have a backdoor that couldn't be used by someone without the government's authorization, such as a hacker.
I lack the compsci background to evaluate these claims myself though, and would appreciate if someone could point out a way this could be done. I don't know if the privacy advocates making this case are overstating their cause, or if they're correct. They sound correct at first blush.
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Conviction that you are not the gender assigned to you at birth is the only requirement to be transgender or non-cisgender. +
+ I've tried my best to make this post as clear as possible, and I've included two sections that are very important:**This view is NOT**, and **Things that would CMV** so you can target the key points and not tangents or related issues when you reply to me.
In reddit and in many other places I've seen a lot of talk about transmedicalism, which states that if a person does not experience dysphoria (Most often specifically the part where you exerience loathing towards your bodily sex characteristics and manifest a desire to change them) they can't be trans and must therefore be cisgender. I know for a fact, that these ideas are a reaction to claims from so-called "SJW's" that they are some newfangled stargender, or a magigirl, or identities that seem to be, and that in many many cases actually are a call for attention or an attempted claim to oppression.
My view is that this reaction is not really representative of reality, and erases people who are most definitely LGBT+, today and in history. I recently came to this conclusion, and it does seem a bit flimsy still, so I'm really interested in hearing the counterarguments so I can either edit my view to something more fitting, learn from the counterarguments, or drop it altogether.
Here are the reasons that i believe this:
* Transvestites, people who liked to wear women's clothes and used female pronouns, but didn't mind being recognized as male when not in drag or crossdressing. Marsha P Johnson was known to be fine with male pronouns from close friends, and never sought to transition, to call her cis would still be inaccurate.
* My own experience. I know anecdotes are not evidence, but I'm explaining why I hold this view. I dunno why I've been obsessed with dresses and gowns since childhood. I came out as gay a year or so ago ad recently discovered drag, and nothing has ever felt so right, the idea of presenting as a woman while having that sort of dual gender feels like it describes me perfectly. I'm still hesitant to call myself genderqueer or genderfluid but I'm also not sure that it's accurate to call myself a guy.
* The fact that not wanting to chop one's weiner or boobs off implies that one's identity is set in stone and saying anything else is calling for attention in the transmedicalist view. I don't think you can talk about human psychology in such rigid terms.
**This View is NOT**
* That all non cis identities are valid. I'm not gonna defend stargender or magigirl/boy, mostly because I think those either don't exist or in the case of the latter are so close to a gender (it's literally the definition) that they might as well be binary.
* That being trans non-cis is a choice. I still think that this internal sense of how we identify is ruled by things like brain chemistry or exposure to certain hormones while in the womb (as shown by digit ratio)
* That womanhood and manhood are limited to things like clothing, makeup , and roles and stereotypes. A key thing I mentioned is that people above all want to be recognized and treated like a certain gender (through gendered words and pronouns and whatnot) and often their presentation reflects that, rather than interest int he objects of the presentation by themselves.
**Things that would CMV**
* If I have a fundamental misunderstanding of the point of transmedicalism, or the definition of dysphoria that they use
* If I have a fundamental misunderstanding of gender and what it means
* If my feelings and those of others are better explained by things unrelated to gender identity or being non cisgender
* If not being transmedicalist can harm trans people who suffer from dysphoria.
* And of course other things I don't know yet, but these are I think the pillars of my view.
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Most spies or spy agencies in most recent spy movies would be horrible at their jobs in the real world. +
+ In the recent spy movies we've had, there are very few spies that would make good spies.
Recent films:
* November Man: Senior CIA operative is involved with his target and tells no-one, creating a massive conflict of interest. It makes him go against his CIA superiors.
* A Most Wanted Man: Covert ops spy gets his cover blown by relatively minor political attaché *working for the same government*.
* RED series: zero stealth on the part of agencies in the films and the team of spies. Operative methods seem to be to blow/shoot shit up.
* James Bond Series: Gets things done but in a usually very apparent and traceable way. Prone to get dangerously sidetracked from the mission by things that really don't matter. MI6 is infiltrated pretty often in the series, and there seems to be an issue with operational stealth on their end too.
* Mission Impossible: See James Bond. Substitute MI6 with whatever Hawk works with.
* Kingsman: See Mission Impossible. Substitute MI6 with "The Kingsmen".
* Cold Light of Day: Agent tells a bunch of people he's an agent.
* Bourne Series: Agency who is supposed to track Bourne is pretty bad at tracking Bourne, is infiltrated, is corrupt... Also likes to blow things up.
Spy movie is too often synonymous with action movie, and it pisses me off, since spy work is almost exactly the opposite. *Tinker, Taylor, Soldier, Spy* was a good one though. Most spy movies are more about super soldiers than super spies.
CMV!
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Prejudice based on things one can change is still wrong +
+ Many people think that racism, sexism, ageism etc. are wrong because it is a judgment of a person based on something he can't change. I don't think that is why these prejudices are bad. I think they are bad simply because they are prejudices. I think that bringing up for example political affiliation, religious beliefs, wealth, clothing or hairstyle in support of an argument [1] is an argumentative foul and an intellectually dishonest thing to do, exploiting prejudices of people.
I think that:
1. Arguments should be judged based on the content of the argument, not the people stating them
2. All prejudices are bad and should be fought against, without prioritizing the prejudices based on things one can't change [2]
[1] Of course that excludes the cases when the thing in question is direct subject of the argument - like "John believes in God, he's a Christian", this doesn't evoke any prejudice.
[2] I am fine with prioritization based on different, better criteria, for example prioritizing prejudice which has the largest socioeconomic effect in the society (however one measures that).
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: The reason people are against sagging pants to the point of erecting laws against it has absolutely nothing to do with race. +
+
-------------------------------------------------
I have been against it for years. Frankly I find it unsightly as well as unhygienic. Recently among the race stuff showing up in the media people tried saying this was one. Just another race baiting tactic. I’m an open minded individual about lots things, but your argument has to be pretty damn good to CMV. If your ride public transportation or sit in any public area, during the summer especially, your bare ass is only separated from the seat by a thin piece of cloth. How could anyone with a shred of common sense find this okay? Its incredibly gross.
Just look at it from a spectators point of view. More than 95% of people are appalled by this “fashion trend” that has also been widely proven to come from prison. Why would you want to give off that type of air about you. Who wants to look at someone else’s underwear anyway? There is absolutely no other place where people show off their underwear in such a manner and get away with it. It is indecent exposure.
**There are a plenty of reasons that this trend gets so much hate and none of them have to do with race.** Tell me one fashion trend that's as bad as this that gets no attention. You can't. I mean hell, black people aren’t the only one’s that do it. I guarantee that if there was a “fashion trend” as atrocious as this started by any other group it would get the same backlash.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Free Trade only benefits big business, and is detrimental to developed and developing countries. +
+ There has been a lot of talk lately about how free trade is great for the economy in Canada, but the principles can likely be applied to other developed countries. The general idea is that Canada buys mass produced stuff from developing countries because they can make it cheaper there than we can back home. In return we sell some Blackberries, tar sand oil, maple syrup, and apologies.
Big business wins. They get to make their widgets at the lowest cost possible while maximizing their profit. Other than a few "we give back" marketing campaigns that try to suggest that corporations have souls, as long as the dollars keep rolling in, they don't care.
Developed countries lose. Our politicians talk about a declining/shrinking middle class, when they are signing free trade agreements that further incentivize off-shoring middle class jobs. They lament the lack of manufacturing jobs while we make it easier for companies to bring in cheaper stuff from other countries.
Quality also suffers. In countries that take pride in home grown manufacturing (looking at you America) typically you pay more for the made at home product, but it is often made to a higher standard. I would pay more for something made in Canada, but it is becoming increasingly difficult to do so.
Developed countries "win" because they can buy a bunch of cheap junk with planned obsolescence so we keep buying more, which perpetuates the cycle.
Developing countries lose. The Rana Plaza collapse, and the suicide nets for jumpers are two big things that come to mind, but plenty more issues exist as well. Working conditions are extremely dangerous, the workers are often exposed to hazardous chemicals without proper protection, and many of those chemicals are not disposed of correctly which has a huge environmental impact. The money generated by manufacturing typically goes into the hands of very few, and the majority of it goes to the corporations that don't pay taxes on it anyway. Instead of producing goods and services that could go back into their own economy, they are exporting everything and just providing cheap and unethical labour.
Free Trade is bad. Instead of providing incentives for off-shoring, we should be providing incentives to keep work at home. Canadian manufacturers (and those in other developed countries) could compete and beat international prices if taxes and tariffs were in place to level the playing field. All of the factory workers who are out of work would have much better prospects than minimum wage service jobs, which would lead to a thriving middle class that would be great for our economy, and we could keep some of that corporate profit (and tax) in Canada, because we wouldn't be buying from all over the world. We already protect dairy and poultry farming to keep those jobs and products in country, why not everything else?
For those of you that made it this far, I understand that there are a few things that would be particularly difficult to produce or manufacture in Canada. Produce we don't have the climate for, or natural resources we don't have an abundance of come to mind, but the vast majority of what we consume from other countries could be made at home.
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Infidelity should be punishable under civil law. +
+ Humans have decided that trust is how we operate. It is the basis of contract law, of commerce, of nations, of democracy and last but certainly not least, it is the basis of personal relationships. If we are willing to try people for breaches of trust in these areas, why then when someone cheats on their partner can the partner not sue for breach of trust? That's not even accounting for the emotional trauma. I don't think that people should go to prison for it but awarding some level of damages to the other person seems fair to me. I feel like I should mention I've never cheated or been cheated on, this is just something I was thinking of earlier today.
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: I believe that in-game/in-app advertisements (popups) are useless and makes the user more inclined to swipe them away rather than read them +
+ I absolutely despise in-game ads. They get in the way of the game and never seem to take a break. I believe that they make the user more inclined towards hating the app they're being promoted on and the product the ad is for, rather than reading what the advertisement says. I know it generates revenue for the game developers, but surely there must be a better way. [The fullscreen ads in applications even annoyed Google](http://www.engadget.com/2015/07/24/google-interstitial-ads/).
Even if I do read the advertisement or watch the sample video, I'll forget about their product after the ad finishes or goes away, as I'll go back to playing the game or using the app. It even makes the experience of using the app annoying. I used to play CandyFrenzy and after every 3-4 turns, a fullscreen ad used to popup and I had to swipe it away. After playing that game for months, I never paid attention to the advertisement, which shows how inefficient they were in putting the message across or gaining the attention of the user. CMV. | malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Everyone does not have equal value +
+ Commonly it is stated that every human has equal value, I do not believe that is the case.
I personally do not think there is such a thing as objective value as I believe that the concept of value is a human construct. I think that the value a person possesses is determined by the value that he/she and other humans consider him/her possessing. Following that line of reasoning it is quite evident that everyone does not have equal value as everyone is not treated as if they have equal value.
Still, i would like to take it one step further and say that everyone should not be considered to have equal value. It is hard to define value but for simplicity i will use the most common social construct for value measurement: economics. I will try to explain my view with the following analogy:
You find yourself facing the option to either pay for Adolf Hitler’s or Nelson Mandela’s life. Most people would not hesitate before choosing to save Nelson Mandela. Thus they value him higher than Adolf Hitler. I would argue that this is the morally best decision.
So, am I missing some central point, or maybe I am defining value in a poor way?
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Pocahontas was wrong about cutting down sycamore trees in relation to knowing their height. +
+ This CMV is about the self consistency of the statement in "Colors of the wind" not necessarily whether in reality cutting down a sycamore tree makes sense.
In the song, there are two principle lines which relate to the knowability of the height of a sycamore tree.
First, Pocahontas asks "How high can the sycamore grow?" Second, she states that "If you cut [the sycamore tree] down, you will never know."
The second line seems straightforward enough, if you cut it down it might keep growing and you will not know its ultimate potential height. However, the statement is problematic because it assumes that if you do not cut down the sycamore tree, then you could eventually know how high a sycamore tree can grow. If this assumption is not made, then there is really know point to the statement in the context of the song because all it is saying now is that whatever you do you can never know how high the sycamore tree can grow. If whatever you do relating to the sycamore tree is futile, then not cutting it down doesn't serve the purpose she is proposing.
If you can know the height that the sycamore tree can grow if you don't cut it down, then at that point you can cut it down and still know how high it can grow. Thus, the assumptions that Pocahontas puts forth are self-contradictory and at least one must be incorrect.
To change my view, you must either prove that Pocahontas is not making the assumptions that I say she is making or that these premises are not inherently contradictory.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: I don't think Target should have made everything "gender neutral". +
+ Okay, so first of all, I'm not necessarily a liberal, but I'm no conservative either. I'm sort of a mixed bag; there are some liberal things I agree with (Raising taxes on the rich, welfare, increased minimum wage, equal pay rates on both men and women [although this has been a hot topic on whether it's true or not, because where I work both men and women are paid the same] but I also have a few conservative views like this one; now I just want to say, I have no problem with girls playing with trucks or boys playing with dolls. However, I don't agree with Target making everything "Gender neutral". If someone wants to dress their boy in "masculine" colors or their baby girl in "feminine" colors, then let them do it. The same way vice-versa. However, I think that getting rid of gender specific toy aisles is stupid because it just makes it harder for parents to find their children toys; some boys want masculine toys, just like some girls want feminine toys. If a girl wants a masculine toy, the parent could easily go to the boy's section and buy a toy from there for his or her daughter; in fact, my parents did this often. However, what I don't agree with is dressing (young) boys in girl's clothes or painting his nails. I don't really think parents should be discussing this sort of thing until the child is a teenager (or around that age). Another thing I noticed is that many "SJWs" have said that buying masculine toys for boys makes them masculine. Surely buying feminine toys for him would make him feminine if this was the case?
TL;DR, I think boys and girls will act masculine or feminine when they grow up regardless of the toys they are given or the clothes their parents give them. | resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Asking what someone's ethnic background is in casual conversation is not microaggression nor racist behavior. +
+ I have some friends who get terribly offended when they are asked what their ethnicity is. These friends are Korean, Chinese, and Iranian.
In conversations, each has expressed that such questions are racist in nature no matter the context. I completely disagree and here is why:
I'm Italian, German, and Native American. My entire life I've also been asked the same question. I've been asked it by people of all ethnicities; even my ex-wife (chinese) asked me when she and I first met.
Sometimes, with me, people don't ask, they guess. I've gotten spanish, greek, middle-eastern,white, italian, etc... even this I do not consider to be racist.
And, as far as it being a form of white-privledge when asked by a Caucasian person (which one of my friends says it is), I have noticed that my "white" friends do this to each other as well. "What are you? Irish? Scottish? Etc..."
My view is that It is a legitimate and benign question to ask, and unless a person is partnering the question with other racist behaviors it is not a racist question on any level.
CMV.
****
**UPDATE: Hi all, thanks for the contributions so far. I'm really glad that this has remained civil and constructive this far. A couple thoughts so far:
- I agree with many of you that this line of questioning can be rude or shallow. In fact, I realize that I even leave out some of my own heredity when asked this question simply because I don't like the conversation that inevitably follows.
- also, I wanted to clarify that I don't personally ask this question in regular conversation often. I get asked it more than I ask it, which is where this post stems from: I don't mind the question, while some of my friends have expressed that it is inherently a racist question.
- the responses from many of you regarding personal experience has helped me understand where my friends are coming from in their contempt of this question. However, I still put it in "potentially rude" realm and nothing worse.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: I have no sympathy towards violent criminals at the point of crime +
+ I can never understand people when they lament about how they feel sorry for someone who just commited a violent crime.
I understand being sympathetic towards a non-violent thief who might be destitute, or a murderer who has done his time and apologized.
But someone who has just done a horrible act of violence towards another person (and hasn't repented yet) doesn't deserve sympathy from anyone, unless they genuinely believe he/she is innocent, or committed the crime in self-defense.
One argument people make is that the guilty crime was committed "in the heat of moment". I see this often being used to defend road ragers and drunk wife-beaters. I can't agree with this argument because it unfairly takes responsibility away from the criminal. If we left every criminal go easy because the crimes were "emotional" or "spur of the moment", we'd have a lot of unstable people out on the streets ready go to off at any moment and hurt others.
Another argument I hear is that the criminal was a "victim of the circumstances", i.e. he was poor or grew up in a dysfunctional family. This is a totally reasonable argument if the crime is non-violent, but being poor or traumatized is not an excuse to kill somebody or even go beat someone up. Anyone who makes a conscious choice to hurt someone physically is simply an asshole.
I oppose the death penalty and am in favor of restorative prison reform, so I hear people giving these criminals moral slack (at more than just a legal or health-based level) all the time, and it drives me crazy. But I want to see the POV they are coming from, so please try to CMV.
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Space Debris is not a problem for the foreseeable future +
+ Hey,
So I always read about space debris as this big crisis or this problem that is something people are really worried about.... this just doesn't make any sense to me.
It seems to me that if we could view all orbiting matter on a single plane the size of even the earth's crust it would be very clear that space debris is not an immediate issue. The amount of debris relative to the size of the area is not that much... not even taking into account that it isn't happening on a plane but in 3-D space.
Why is this wrong with this? I guess this doesn't take into account gravity (the gravitational pull of a satellite may be substantial at orbit - making collision highly likely). Or perhaps the scale of damage even a bolt could have.. but these to me seem so remote....
Over the next, 20 years we will launch a lot more satellites - but only/maybe then they may become an issue - but at the present time it's like talking about not getting in your car because you are worried about drunk drivers - it may be acceptable but it is not rational
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: There's no reason for the United States to continue supporting Israel. +
+ The United States has given support to Israel since the 1960s, but now there's really no purpose. First off, Israel could easily defend themselves against pretty much any invasion or attack, even without US support. Second off, we already have a second ally in the region - Turkey. Not only that, Turkey is a part of NATO, which no country would dare anger. Israel is not, making them way more vulnerable. Third, a retraction of Israeli - US relations would force Israel is reconsider its policy on Palestine, perhaps convincing the Likud party to be less extreme in its decision making. The US no longer supporting Israel = more peace in the long run.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Minimum wage jobs should not be viewed as strictly jobs for teenagers or unskilled workers and instead should be viewed as legitimate careers +
+
* job - Any position where both employer and employee know, or should know, that the position is long-term temporary at best and that at some point the employee will move on.
* career - your chosen life's work. If you work fast food your whole life, that is your career
* minimum wage job - Any job, usually in the service industry, that generally requires little to no formal education, and generally pays between the federal minimum wage up to and including $15.00/hr.
Minimum wage is a hot topic of debate these days, and I'm sure a lot of visitors to this sub are tired of talking about raising, lowering, or eliminating the minimum wage but that isn't what this is about. I did a search and couldn't find anything else that was similar to my stance so I'm hoping it will foster some new discussions.
During every debate concerning minimum wage someone will always say something to the effect that "minimum wage jobs aren't meant to support a family/are meant for teenagers and unskilled workers" and I think that this line of thinking is just outright wrong.
Throughout the past 50 years, people took minimum wage service industry jobs when they were young/inexperienced in order to gain the experience that was required in order to land a production career. That was the viewpoint, you got a minimum wage "job" in order to get the experience to start a "career" in the production world (whether directly producing something, or supporting those who do ie office staff, vendors, logistics, etc.).
Also over that time, the economy in the US has gone from production based to service based. This has caused a severe drop in production "careers" leaving nothing but the service industry left. The service industry is now the career simply due to lack of other options.
I joined the military when I was 20 years old because after working in the service industry at minimum wage for 5 years I finally landed a production job on an assembly line (this was in 1998). The money was better than anything I'd made previously, but not good enough to get ahead. I ended up getting my girlfriend at the time pregnant and I saw the future that my current position offered and I wanted more so I enlisted. I spent 10 years working as an Aviation Electronics Technician before getting out to accept a position as a Federal Law Enforcement Officer with the US Forest Service. I worked at that position for 5 years before losing my job through no fault of my own. So there I was, a very highly skilled electronics tech, with 5 years of law enforcement experience, living in an area where 80% of the available jobs are minimum wage service industry and I needed a job. I applied everywhere....I mean everywhere. I filled out applications for Taco Bell, McDonald's, Walmart, etc. I got exactly 4 callbacks and 2 interviews during my job search where I was filling out 5-10 job applications per week...for 3 years before giving up. I couldn't get hired...why? Because for 15 years I made between $28-75k/year and every employer knows that there is no way I can support my family on minimum wage...and why would they pay me more when they can just pay someone else the minimum. I have been effectively unemployable in my current location since 2011 due in large part to the fact that everyone (including employers) knows minimum wage doesn't pay enough to support a single person, much less a family of six.
I think the mentality that "minimum wage jobs aren't careers and shouldn't pay enough to support a family" is more destructive than it is beneficial.
TL;DR: Minimum wage jobs are no longer the sole realm of teenagers and the unskilled because the US doesn't produce anything anymore so those are the only careers available to most people.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Political candidates who refuse to detail their policies are making the right choice. +
+ Every election year this is one of the most popular complaints against candidates: lack of detailed policy prescriptions.
* "So and so says he's going to reduce the budget, but so far he hasn't offered any specifics."
* "Hillary says she has a plan for restarting the Israel-Palestine peace process, but so far nobody has been able to nail her down on the details."
* Recently right here on one of the CMV posts about Bernie Sanders, /u/bayernownz1995 says that "Sanders *does* have a solid page on racial injustice on his site, but it is a little weak in terms of actual policy prescriptions. Compared to O'Malley's page, Sanders has a lot of work to do."
You hear these complaints all. The. Time. In newspapers, on blogs, on TV news, in debates, etc. Candidate X offers no details, they're evasive in answering questions, they're canny, they give bland lip service to a problem and make happy talk about solutions, but they never *actually say what it is they're going to do if elected*. It's like the default setting of oppo research, a ready-made criticism to hurl at a candidate if you don't have any meatier, muddier dirt to fling their way.
But the thing is, there are very good reasons for candidates to be evasive. For one thing, if they were to offer actual policy details during a campaign, then they'd spend the entire rest of the campaign defending and arguing about those details. If someone found an error or mistake or potential pitfall, they might have to revise their plan -- revise a policy that doesn't even exist yet! Political opponents hire specialists in opposition research, and the more material those specialists have, the more they'll be able to distract and distort your candidate's plan in order to make them look bad. Giving them an entire piece of draft legislation, or an entire detailed budget document showing cuts and spending, etc. would be like a godsend to the oppo research people. And all for what? For an imaginary policy that doesn't even exist yet. No candidate in their right mind would open up so many vulnerabilities all for the sake of a policy that doesn't even exist outside of the candidate's website.
Secondly, no political candidate is running for the office of dictator. Whether someone is running for President, Senate, Congress, Governor, state legislator, dog catcher, etc., the important thing to remember is that politicians have to work with other politicians, and agencies, bureaucracies, other constituents, etc. They have to work with other people to get anything accomplished. So if you get elected to office with a complete, massively detailed economic stimulus package combined with spending cuts and tax cuts, don't expect every other member of Congress to just roll over and rubber stamp your policy. Politics isn't beanbag, and you'd get crucified by the players in Washington (or any other capital). Oh, you promised you were going to cut the F-22 fighter? Well guess what, that's going to throw 60,000 people out of work in my district. And you want me to just vote for it because *your* supporters voted for you? How about f--k you?"
If you got elected with a detailed policy proposal, everyone in the government responsible for putting your policy into motion would have you over a barrel. Every change they make to your policy would threaten to make you a "liar," a judas, a traitor, etc. to the people who supported you, as well of course as your political enemies. Your policy details would become a millstone around your neck and a gun to your head. Your friends and enemies alike would be able to use all of your detailed promises on the campaign trail in order to wrap you around their fingers.
So that's my view: politicians would be insane to offer detailed policy answers to any given question, and they are wise to stick to vague generalities, advertising language, happy talk, etc. Can you think of a good reason for politicians to spell out their promises in detail?
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Using Adblock (or similar software) is an overall detriment to the internet +
+ Nearly all websites only have two options for generating revenue and staying online:
1. Sell ads
2. Charge the consumer directly
Selling ads is obviously the easier method and it typically used more often than charging directly because it doesn't ask the consumer to pay up front. This allows the consumer to get a taste of what the site has to offer before they put some of their own money on the line (potentially with a "premium" service like Reddit Gold).
If people continue to use Adblock or other similar software to completely block ads, the option to keep the lights on by selling ads gets harder and harder. This means that selling access to the site in the form of a subscription (or something similar) becomes the only option. This is frankly a bad thing because consumer will be unwilling to risk spending money on a subscription if they aren't sure about the content. Smaller sites will find it harder to stay afloat and new sites will have a very difficult time getting off the ground.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Superman Returns is a better movie than Man of Steel. +
+ As we all know, the viewers/stuidos/whoever were displeased with the reception of Superman Returns hence issued a reboot. They did basically a polar opposite take with the reboot and we got whatever that Zack Snyder monstrosity. Not only did I not like Man of Steel, but I thought Superman Returns was a decent film.
Superman Returns. The more I rewatch it, the more I realize how they were trying to make a movie that was very authentic to the style of the Chrisopher Reeves movies. The first thing we have to agree on is that Christopher Reeves those movies' portrayl of Superman are what everyone identifies as Superman. So in a nod to that, Superman Returns is in that vein. Brandon Roth carries himself a lot like Reeves did, the dialogue follows the same style, and so on. Its a very charming and light portrayal of Superman which is how Reeves' movies did it. The movie itself tries to never get too dark or serious, much like the originals. Instead its about the character interaction, showing the marvelous feats, and kind of creating the world as it exists in the Superman mythos. The movie is family friendly, funny at times, has a good cast of actors. My only outright criticism is that they really took for granted the viewer's familiarity with the past Superman movies. They basically wasted no time in backstory by just referencing the events of the other movies. I think making this an extension of the Reeves films more or less outright was taking something of an extreme liberty.
But Man of Steel is all in all a dark (literally and figuratively) film. It gives a de jour emo portrayal of Superman; moody, conflicted, enigmatic. An excessive amount of time/scenes is spent on showing Superman's emotions and character building. Christopher Reeves was just Superman, a guy who was just all-around iconic and always stood strong in the pocket. Then Henry Cavill goes and lets his father die unnecessarily in a tornado? Also Christopher Reeves barely cried in all four films, yet Henry Cavill has done so twice already in the first movie. And would a Christopher Reeves movie ever end in him breaking the neck of his enemy right before a couple of children get vaporized? The cinematography is dark and the visual effects look a lot like Green Latern (which probably isn't a good thing). The backstory about Krypton is god-awful convoluted, unnecessary, and difficult to understand. All the fighting seems inconsequential because aside from showing us constant grandiose destruction, we can't tell if the hits have any effect. In the Reeves flicks, characters showed injuries, came up lame, grunted, cried out in pain. In this one, Superman and his foes get knocked a quarter mile through concrete wall just to return the favor. You absolutely never knew when the fight was going to end. I could go on and on but those are some of the big points that seem to make it a lesser film to me.
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Children should have the vote. +
+ Note: I'm from the UK where voting age is 18 (or 16 in all Scottish independence referendums).
I believe that all children should be eligible to a vote.
My argument for this is that decisions of government (or, say, as a result of plebiscite) also impact children's lives and, if anything, have a greater impact in the long term than for adults as they typically have longer to live through the repercussions.
To clarify, my practical view of an implementation of this is that a responsible guardian would vote on behalf of the child until such a point as the guardian feels the child is suitably mature to make their own decision or the child has reached a certain age.
-----
I feel people are paying too much attention to the suggestion for implementation rather than the overall idea.
Nevertheless, I edit the suggestion to be that whenever the child wishes to adopt the decision over their vote and can get an adult to vouch for them, the child and not the guardian should vote.
I have awarded a delta for this.
----
I shall attempt to debunk a couple of reactions I think will quickly come to many minds:
*More babies means more POWER, mwah-ha-ha!!!
-No, I don't think that any person falling within even an extreme definition of sane would attempt to influence an election by simply having more and more children.
*Would this not lead to greater pandering and unfairly positive treatment of families? What about people who are without children?
-Whilst I would agree that families would perhaps get more positive treatment than they currently do, that is sort of my argument. Consider a single parent with two children; those are three people, not one and so surely their access to decision making should reflect this fact. Should there be better deals for families as a result of such an electoral reform (and perhaps worse deals for those without), is this not simply fairer and more reflective?
Further note that I'm aware there are other groups without the right to vote who perhaps should have it, but that is not the subject of this CMV.
-----
-----
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Breastfeeding in public is tantamount to indecent exposure. +
+ First I'm not a prude and I'm completely fine with nudity. I honestly wouldn't care if they abolished all public decency laws and everyone walked around naked. However, that doesn't change the fact that the laws exist, and are the basis of my argument. For the people who do get uncomfortable around nude breasts, a single father with his adolescent daughter, or a mother with a teenage son, or even some old stick in the mud curmudgeon, I don't think it's too much to ask to handle such things in private. Whether pumping milk, or nursing at home, there are ways of handling these things. No one else is obligated to accommodate
public nudity. If it's not "convenient" for them, that's all part of the sacrifice of parenthood.
__
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV:The Nuremberg defense isn't that bad +
+ When the german leaders were put on trial after WWII, They claimed they were just following orders but it was decided that this was not good enough. Hitler could have had them and their children killed for refusing to obey orders. soldiers who refused orders were killed and their families received no help from the state and suffered penalties.
so why wasn't this a good defence? were they legally supposed to be martyrs? You can't legally force someone to allow themselves and their families to die/suffer badly even if it means saving others lives
obligatory "obligatory wow gold?"
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: In the US, specialized high schools are revenue centers for the college industry. +
+ For all of those outside of the US, in the states going to college/university is very expensive and will drain the finances of the average American and keep them paying for most of their lives. It's a huge profit center, even for "non-profit organizations" (most non profit college corporations pay huge salaries to their directors).
As for specialized high schools, throughout the country there are high schools that attract the higher performing students and gather them into an environment centered around accelerated and competitive learning. By the middle of a student's sophomore year (10th grade/ second year of high school), they have already been bombarded with information about countless colleges and college services. The students are pressured into buying services to give them an upper edge in the college admission process and are instilled with the fear that if they don't get into prestigious institutions they will have not lived up to their potential. The schools themselves even funnel thousands in public dollars to college services and advertising college services. Throughout my junior year (11th grade), I have missed at least four periods of English class because the school wanted us to attend a 40-minute long advertisement assembly for The Princeton Review (test prep service). I'm going into my senior year (12th grade) and watching how all my friends who also go to specialized high schools are being compelled to pour their parents money into countless services to gain an extra edge against other students. The specialized high schools even subtly shame students who pursue going to public universities like myself.
Because of all of these factors, I'm compelled to believe that specialized high schools are just places to gather the students who have high interest in prestigious universities and squeeze all the money out of their families into the US college industry. | malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: USA was unjustified in bombing Japan to hasten the end of World War 2. The government of USA should apologize from the nation of Japan. +
+ Why I hold this view:
1. America can't ever be considered to be justified in using atomic bombs to end a war. Those bombs were dropped on cities full of innocent civilians, women and children. People with real lives, they were emotional sentient beings; not a statistical number. There had to be some other way than decimating two civilian cities just because we want to end a war quickly.
2. Osama Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda executed a brutal plan to orchestrate the 9/11 attacks. [According to them, their major motivation was to end the presence of US in gulf countries and other motives as well.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/September_11_attacks#Motives) For this purpose they chose to ram airplanes in the WTC & Pentagon to achieve maximum civilian casualties and make a frightening spectacle for the US public. The ends justify the means seems to be their reasoning. Was Al-Qaeda & Co justified in perpetrating 9/11?
No one would say yes.
If we observe the reasoning of US generals behind the nuclear bombing to end World War 2, we can see some parallels. Al-Qaeda and American Generals both used a method of causing mass casualties to drive a point across. They both used lives of innocent civilians as a statistic to further their respective causes. The atomic bombings caused 246,000+ casualties (not taking into account the deaths caused later by radiation exposure and cancer. 9/11 caused 3000 deaths.
3. Civilians VS Army: If you believe that the ends justify the means, then dropping the bomb may seem justified. But then you also agree that civilian casualties are fair game to drive a point across. Army is a different thing. A soldier agrees to the dangers of war and hardship for the protection of their nation. They agree to the fact that they may not return alive from a war. A civilian is a different case, their involvement in a war is very remote. To slaughter innocent civilians just because it will hasten the end of a war seems unjustified. Many people hold the viewpoint that the US bombing was in retaliation of Pearl Harbour. But the Japanese attacked a naval base, they did not bomb a hospital or a school did they? If we agree that the end justify the means then logically we have to say that Al-Qaeda was kind of justified to cause 9/11 as well.
4. The argument of USA that the bombing saved more lives compared to Operation Downfall, in the long term, is wrong. Because at least the lives of innocent civilians would have been spared. How do we even know the outcome of Operation Downfall? Moreover Japan was nearly close to surrendering anyway as the Secretary Of War, Henry Louis Stimson agreed:
“Japan had no allies; its navy was almost destroyed; its islands were under a naval blockade; and its cities were undergoing concentrated air attacks.”
We erased two cities and its people from history. We dehumanized them, reduced them to a statistic. W[e even censored images and stories of the Japanese victims to push the narrative in our direction](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki#Depiction.2C_public_response_and_censorship). At least the Government should officially apologize to the nation of Japan. | malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Sex and Violence should be treated with equal standards. +
+ You know what really turns my gears, the fact that here in the US you can get scolded by the populous for putting a sexual undertone in your creation (in adult media outside of porn) while you get praise for putting a lot of action and violence in what you're creating. I personally think that how the general populous' craving for violence while hating on sexual themes is very counter-productive (at least here in the US). I believe how we got this mind set is how violence and sex was perceived back in the Victorian Era where multiple wars were happening within the US and how the upper class thought of nudity as a "lower class" trait. This carried over into World War 1 and 2 where violence pretty much saved the US and made it into the giant economy it was and still mostly is today. And also during the Cold War, religion (mainly Christianity where sex is pretty much looked down especially with Homosexuality) was taking over and the US population perceived Russia as a "Communist Atheist" county. This old mindset has to stop and thus we need to move on into a more accepting culture. And I'm not talking about "Oh let's just legalize Pedophilia and Bestiality", I'm talking about treating sexual themes and violence in the same matter. Also I don't believe we should expose younger children to sexual themes as the same matter with extreme violence within our media.
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Economic growth in developed countries is bad and will lead to resource strain in the future. +
+ Estimates show that the average american uses around 4 times the resources that the planet could support, if everyone was an American. These numbers are somewhat lower in Western Europe, however still double what the planet could support at 8 billion people. My point is the more that people in developed countries accumulate wealth, the less wealth there will be for developing and undeveloped countries to accumulate. If we do not accept that our material wealth must remain stagnant from now on in places such as America, and Europe; countries in places such as Africa and Asia will forever be stuck in a low income way of life. | malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Westerners' over hostility to less extreme Islamism is uninformed and unpractical +
+ Hello
Whenever I see a post about Islamism or conflicts including an Islamist side I see several errors that I will try to summarize
1- Not distinguishing between different movements, for example mixing Hamas, ISIS and the Muslim brotherhood as one and the same when the literature actions and circumstances of these groups are different even if they were connected as some point or even today.
2- Assuming that Islamist organizations are internally coherent while in many cases there is ideological internal struggle between their members.
3- Misinterpreting the language Islamists use, for example Hamas's famous commitment to the destruction of Israel is a widely held view in the Arab world however It is never explicit that it means genocidal procedure while the killing Christians and Jews
is explicitly banned (even if they are considered second class citizens by many).
4- The cons of Islamist rule is not weighted against the cons of Military nationalist rule which is often the alternative (I am not saying one is always better than the other).
I am not sure if I need to say this or not but I live in Egypt and I am no longer a Muslim (I am non religious now) .
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Arby's is amazing, and by far the most underrated fast food. +
+ I've always been a huge Arby's fan. In my mind, Arby's stands head and shoulders above virtually every other fast food option. I think their food is fresh, original, flavorful, and affordable. If most people gave it an honest chance, they would like it.
I recently realized how poor of a reputation Arby's has when [Comedy Central released a super-cut of all the Jon Stewart Arby's jokes](http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/business/wp/2015/08/07/how-arbys-came-to-embrace-jon-stewarts-jabs-and-even-created-a-sandwich-in-his-honor/). Conan O'Brien has had [his own Arby's gag going for over a decade](http://teamcoco.com/jokes/tag/6360-arbys), at one point earning himself a gag "free Arby's for life" card due to the sheer volume of on-air Arby's mentions.
The main criticism of these comedians is that the food is artificial, stomach busting, mystery meat. And I think anyone who's eaten at Arby's ever knows that that's just not true. The food is great, it doesn't taste fast-foody at all, and most of it is downright mouth watering. I remain thoroughly convinced that, if everyone could try Arby's without all the marketing bias of a lifetime of anti-Arby's jokes, they would come away loving it.
It's hard to demonstrate taste with writing, but let me give you the next best thing, pictures. Note, all real photos, no promotional images. [Though do have a look at the promotional photos](http://arbys.com/the-meats)
#It's not just the curly fries.
- [Look at this god damn brisket sandwich](http://i.imgur.com/3l0yMEr.jpg).
- [Look at this juicy beef and cheddar](http://i.imgur.com/hOWQMc0.jpg).
- [Look at these giant ass onion rings](http://i.imgur.com/sXTePJy.jpg).
- [Look at this god damn steak sandwich](http://i.imgur.com/9fUTXOI.jpg)
- [Fine, yeah, the curly fries are awesome](http://i.imgur.com/BMOQERz.jpg)
- [And yes, the meat mountain does exist, though I've never ordered it](https://www.google.com/search?q=arby%27s+curly+fries&safe=off&espv=2&biw=1375&bih=712&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0CAYQ_AUoAWoVChMIzcCQ7q-dxwIVSIoNCh0TRQiT#safe=off&tbm=isch&q=arby%27s+meat+mountain) | resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Anti-theists and Westboro Baptist have just as much right to publicly express their views as anybody else does. +
+ I don't like this view, and I actually want someone to convince me otherwise. Basically, it seems to me that if you believe something is hurting people, you should have the right to tell everyone. If you believe that religion is actually destroying society, then you should have the right to tell everyone, and if you don't then you're a pretty bad person. The same thing for Westboro Baptist, if they really think that homosexuality means you'll burn in hell, then you're a pretty bad person if you don't let them know.
I should say that being violent in the same way as Westboro Baptist is not what I'm talking about. Going to people's funerals and essentially dancing on their graves is wrong. What I'm talking about is people having the right and responsibility to tell people about what they believe is harmful in the world. I'm also strongly against the way that anti-theists talk about religion as if it's a disease, but it really seems to me that if they don't they're a bad person, so I really want to know if there is some reason that I'm overlooking.
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Saying that America is too politically correct is being used as an excuse for hateful and disrespectful speech that would otherwise be shunned. +
+ This CMV was sparked by the reaction to Donald Trump from the right in the recent GOP Candidate Debate but extends to everyone who intentionally used political incorrectness for personal or political gain.
Donald Trump, who was once considered a joke candidate is now leading most polls for the GOP nomination, mostly due to his unapologetic opinions about things and his willingness to be open about his policies and ideas. He has also said that “I think the big problem this country has is being politically correct,” and to some extent I agree; political correctness has gone too far in this country and people need to be less offended by things. However, he has used "political incorrectness" as an excuse for his awful behavior and comments such as the mexican rapists invading our border and how Rosie O'Donell is a "fat slob" and instead of facing criticism for his opinions is being championed as some sort of visionary for people who's opinions don't align with the mainstream instead of the jackass that he is.
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Zoophilia should not be illegal +
+
First, I believe that if there is no valid reason for an activity to be illegal, it should not be illegal. If an activity is outlawed, and this provides no benefit, it hurts not only the offender, who is punished, but the society that must spend resources to punish them. I believe that the burden of proof should be on those who would outlaw something/keep it outlawed to provide a valid reason for why that should be outlawed.
I believe that there is no reason sufficient to justify the illegality of bestiality/zoophilia. I'll be listing and responding to in this post some ideas others might see as valid reasons, mostly to save top-level commenters some time.
reason 1: Bestiality threatens the animal's well-being and should therefore be illegal.
-this is probably one of the most common arguments, but I believe it falls short. importantly, not all sex acts are necessarily harmful to the animal. While some CAN be harmful, these would already be illegal under animal abuse laws. it might be beneficial to add penalties to animal abuse with sexual motives, but even if it is, it could easily be accomplished without also criminalizing harmless sex acts.
reason 1a: Animals cannot consent to sex, therefore all bestiality is rape, and should therefore be illegal.
-another common one, which I'm semi-lumping with 1. it is true that animals are incapable of giving legal consent to sex. I challenge, however, that the legal and moral ideas of sexual consent in humans can be copypasted onto animals in the way that those who call all bestiality rape seem to be doing. First, nobody (well, not very many people) care about the consent of animals in other important areas. We capture, contain, breed, sterilize, perform experiments on, give invasive medical procedures to, euthanize, and eat animals on a regular basis, and we never ask the animals for permission first. While it's true that some of those are done for the animal's own benefit, which they couldn't understand, others are done because we don't give a shit about what the animals think. This view has lots of opponents, of course, but is currently accepted by most legal systems. Why, then, should the law suddenly care about the animal's consent when it comes to sex?
another distinction is that a healthy human will be able to, at some point in their lives, give consent. When they can't, it's usually because of a temporary condition, such as childhood, unconsciousness, or the effects of a mind-altering substances. Consent, therefore, is usually a voluntary decision on the part of the person, and not giving consent is often implicit or explicit indication that sex is actively unwanted.
Animals, however, are never able to 'give consent' in the commonway, regardless of health, age, or any other factor. However, since most species have been fucking for hundreds of millions of years, it's a safe assumption that a lack of consent doesn't always indicate that sex is unwanted. Now, I'm not saying that it's impossible for bestiality to be 'rape' in a meaningful sense; animals could certainly resist and experience distress during the process. However, like physically harmful sex acts, this could (and should) be covered under animal abuse laws, without criminalizing instances of 'rape' where the animal is either neutral or enjoying the experience.
reason 2:Bestiality threatens the zoophile's well-being and should therefore be illegal.
This could probably be a post in its own right, but it's my belief that mentally abled adults should not be bound by laws 'for their own good'. and, for the most part, these laws fortunately don't exist that much. it's not illegal in most places for people to jump off a cliff or drink bleach, and if that's valid I see no reason why it should be illegal to engage in dangerous activities with an animal, sexual or otherwise (outside of what would be abuse, of course).
reason 3: bestiality can threaten the well-being of third parties, and should therefore be illegal.
-there are two parts to this I can think of: spread of zoonoses (diseases spread by animals that affect humans) and harmful learned behavior of animals.
Sexual activity, of course, allows for easy spread of disease. A zoophile, could easily, therefore, catch a disease form an animal and spread it to others. however, sexual contact is not the only way to transmit most diseases, which means this is another issue that could be covered by a law that also covers other possibilities without punishing 'safe' activity.
another concern by some is that animals used to having sex with some individuals will harass or rape others. This is a genuine concern, but considering animals can also be deliberately trained to, say, attack and kill humans, this is once again an issue that is not unique to animal-human interactions involving sex, and could be covered by other laws (probably involving negligence) without punishing owners of well-trained animals.
reason 4: Zoophilia is prohibited by X religion and should therefore be illegal
-Hope I don't have to with this much. seperation of church and state, I assume that's accepted by most of you.
reason 4a: Zoophilia is an abomination/crime against nature and should therefore be illegal.
-whatever an 'abomination' or a 'crime against nature' is now, people ten or twenty years from now probably won't agree with you. these labels are completely arbitrary, and any support for them is usually pseudo-mystical reasoning that is formulated to support existing opinions. Let nature punish crimes in her own courts, not the taxpayers'.
reason 4aI: zoophilia is disgusting and should therefore be outlawed
-basically 4a, but not as pretentious. Disgust is completely subjective and has no place in law, especially if the digusting activity is done in private.
I think this covers most of them, but I'm interested to see counterarguments to my responses and other potential reasons. | resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Bernie Sanders can't follow up on any of his points laid out in his agenda as long as the GOP remains influential in the Senate. +
+ Having one Bernie Sanders as President is one thing but I don't think it'll result in anything even close to what his supporters would hope.
Let's cut the cynicism for a moment and let's say that Bernie Sanders is one hundred percent dedicated and accomplishing each and every one of his goals laid out in his agenda.
Given that the right hates this guy and the amount of corporate influence amongst the Senate (and it's not just limited to the right, I realize), I don't think it's worth being invested in who becomes President so long as the GOP remains as influential as they are in Congress.
We don't need one Bernie. We need 100 Bernies.
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: I don't think the BlackLivesMatter protester should have interrupted Sanders' rally. However, it makes sense to choose Sanders as the candidate to interrupt, rather than anyone else +
+ I know Sanders is probably the best candidate for BLM policies (though O'Malley is good as well), and that his supporters are probably the most likely to support BLM. This is exactly why I think he's the right choice.
First, I think it means you get less backlash against the movement in general. If she were to interrupt another candidate, more people would use that as evidence against the BlackLivesMatter movement in general. That means more people would use the incident to negatively paint the entire BLM movement since they are less familiar with it, while the Sanders supporters who would be upset would be the least likely to do this.
Second, it forces Bernie to make a bigger deal out of racial injustice in his campaign. Even if he doesn't support the people who interrupt him, he has to at least issue some statement that says "Why'd you pick on me? Here's everything I'm doing to help . . ." and suddenly, it's a major part of his campaign.
Sanders *does* have a solid [page on racial injustice](https://berniesanders.com/issues/racial-justice) on his site, but it is a little weak in terms of actual policy prescriptions. Compared to [O'Malley's page](https://martinomalley.com/policy/criminal-justice/), Sanders has a lot of work to do. Interestingly enough, O'Malley began to better flush out his policy on criminal just after he was interrupted by BLM protesters.
Forcing his hand in making his stances on racial justice more public and more thorough is the best way to make it a bigger campaign issue, and is the best possible result for the BLM movement at large.
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Abortion is morally equivalent to murder. +
+ I am non-religious, I hold liberal beliefs in most social issues, and I firmly believe that abortion is morally equivalent to murder.
To begin, I want to address the ongoing argument of whether or not an unborn fetus is a person. This discussion, while minorly relevant to the issue of abortion, is not a productive topic to argue over. I believe a fetus is a person in the same way an egg is a chicken. In some regards it is, but in others it isn’t. Regardless, the arguments for my beliefs still hold even if we accept that, no, a fetus is not, in any sense of the word, a person.
However, even if a fetus is not a person, I believe that the *value* of a fetus is equivalent to the *value* of a person. To show this, we must examine why we attribute value to human life at all. I believe that the value of human life is in its potential. A human life has the potential to do good in the world, have positive experiences, and, in some way, be a source of value.The reason that we hold death as such a misfortune is because it robs a person of all possible future good. The experiences, relationships, activities, and choices of the future are, overall, tremendously valuable and the source of much happiness. Murder is such a reprehensible crime because it deprives it victim of so much value.
A human fetus has an equally, if not greater, amount of potential for future experiences and pleasure in comparison to a person. Thus, is should follow that to deny the potential of a fetus would be morally akin to doing so for a born person.
For a far more in-depth argument, Don Marquis's paper "Why Abortion is Immoral" offers some very compelling arguments. While I take issue with a few points, the paper is mostly in line with my beliefs in the matter. [Here is a link, if you are interested.](http://bama.ua.edu/~jklocksiem/221/marquis_wai.pdf ) '
| resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: A forearm tattoo will not negatively affect prospects for higher education or employment. +
+ The title mentions specifically a tattoo on the forearm, but the underlying premise of my argument is based on a tattoo which would not be visible in formal clothing (such as slacks and a button down) but would be visible in casual wear (shorts and T-shirt).
Such a tattoo would not affect chances of college acceptance for three reasons; the ubiquity of tattoos amongst college-aged individuals, the relative unimportance of personal image in the college acceptance process, and the low chance of anyone even seeing the tattoo.
According to a Pew Research Centre report, nearly 38% of college-aged individuals have a tattoo. While that is not a majority by quite a margin, it is a significant amount. Additionally, the popularity and accessibility of tattoos are steadily increasing year by year leading to a greater acceptance amongst a younger crowd. The point here is that because of their widespread nature, tattoos are no longer seen as a sign of rebellion simply because they are so commonplace.
Furthermore, most colleges prefer to accept or deny students based on their applications alone, rather than on interviews. Unlike a job interview, in which personal image can make or break someone’s chances of getting employment, colleges tend to focus more on scholastic and athletic merit, test scores, and lifetime achievements first. Personal image is last on the docket for a school good enough to conduct personal interviews, if even considered at all.
The previous two points also assume that a college will know about this tattoo, whereas that may not even be the case. In an interview process, there is no chance that the tattoo will be exposed in formal clothing. If the tattoo is exposed after acceptance, then there is no risk of a college retroactively denying admission based on that alone.
This third point is also the keystone argument when it comes to employment. For the sake of this argument, I will assume that if an employer knows about any sort of tattoo, it will result in immediately being passed over for the job. This is not consistent with reality and the first two points I make concerning college can be applied to employment as well; tattoos are slowly gaining acceptance in the workforce as the 38% of college students with tattoos graduate and seek employment, and that employers will seek to hire the most qualified candidate with less emphasis placed on personal image. But even discarding these arguments, the possibility of an employer finding out about a tattoo covered by conservative formal clothing in professional situations is nil.
(As some of you may have guessed, I have posted this because I am considering getting a tattoo and want to make an informed decision before doing so. I think I have carefully considered most ways that a tattoo could impact my life, but I wanted to hear some opposing arguments I may have overlooked and figured Reddit could help me out here)
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: The BlackLivesMatter protesters who interrupted the Bernie Sanders event were wrong for doing so. +
+ You may have seen news that BlackLivesMatter protesters interrupted a Bernie Sanders campaign event in Seattle. I think this was wrong to do, because he has fought for civil rights before and his economic platform greatly fights for the poor and working class, in which black people are disproportionately represented.
I also think many of the things that were said by these protesters were racist or at least bigoted in their own right, like criticizing Bernie Sanders for being white.
Why did these protesters think that this was a good thing to do? Why did they think it helps their cause? | malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV:the nuclear bombings on japan can not be justified . +
+ 1.firstly most people who say it is justified don't understand what "justices" and are using it to say "it was ok !"in a more powerful way so a more fitting way of describing the bombings would be it was acceptable for the time and given the options.kill on innocents is not justice nor is it justifiable.
2.the argument "but more people would have been killed!" is not valid as we will never know if more people were saved, but more importantly if we can't tell if more people were saved how would the people at the time know ?adding to this that japan would of surrendered if given the option which can be argued as more people saved then the bombings (not a unconditionally surrender)
3.saying it was justified trivialises the death, decision caused by them and ignores the moral imprecations of the event.(this is a observation made on reddit) that in discussions people are more focused in saying it is justified and giving the same reasons, rather than actually thinking about the event or have any meaningful decision .
| malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Bernie Sanders is a bad person for his immigration policy, and anyone who interprets this as racism on his part has a very good reason for doing so. +
+ http://www.ijreview.com/2015/07/379130-bernie-sanders-immigration-open-border-koch-brothers/
Saying that open borders is a "Koch Brothers Proposal" as though that in any way justifies treating people differently simply on the geographic location in which they were born is an absolutely abhorrent opinion, and I interpret it to mean that Bernie Sanders supports a bourgeois class of elitists who are only really different based on the fact that they were born in America.
No one has any choice over where they happen to be born, and people are *humans first*, regardless of where they are born.
Discrimination based on where someone is born is *exactly equal* to racism. | resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: James Holmes Should Be Executed +
+ I am not a death penalty advocate. I realize and acknowledge the dangers of state executions and the danger to innocents. However, James Holmes is guilty. Beyond any reasonable doubt... He took the lives of many others in his madness. Why should we be forced to pay for his food, housing, healthcare, etc... for the rest of his life, as taxpayers? Is this not salt in the wounds of the victims and their families?
In clear cut cases of mass murder, what is to gain from sustaining these sick minds in a prison cell? Doesn't this just encourage the system of incarceration? I mean, it seems the prison/court system has a clearcut monetary incentive for lifelong incarceration over execution.
--- | resistant | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |
CMV: Animals that attack hikers in national parks should not be put down +
+ Every month or so, we hear about a tragic story of a hiker attacked by an animal (usually a bear) while they are out in the wild. Often times, the animal is unprovoked. But sometimes an animal's instincts will overtake it, and it will perceive a hiker as a potential threat to either it or its offspring. Whenever an attack on a human happens, park officials from wherever the incident occurred place traps to catch and euthanize the animal.
I don't think that animals that attack hikers should be killed. I love the National Park System, and everything they do, but I just don't think that it is appropriate. The NPS was created for the purpose of being preserved. With that preservation comes the opportunity for us as humans to enjoy them in their uttermost beauty, but that doesn't mean we should start altering them for our convenience.
Yes, wild bears can be dangerous. They're BEARS for heaven's sake! But their habitat isn't ours to make our own. Part of hiking through these parks, whether it's the Great Smoky Mountains (where the North America's largest density of black bears reside) or Yellowstone National Park (where a grizzly killed a hiker just yesterday), wild animals are going to be wild.
The national parks are to be preserved, not to be altered for our enjoyment. | malleable | You're a semantic analyst. Judging from the opinion statement, do you think he/she is resistant or malleable to persuasion? |