8 votes

‘Evil has won’ - Pro-American Germans feel betrayed

3 comments

  1. [2]
    Neverland
    Link
    Me too, me too. People are talking about civility being lost in politics, sure that's a problem I guess. But my main concern is the post-truth era. I mean ffs, we are post reason now? Is this the...

    “For me, the key thing is the Enlightenment,” Scharioth said. “I think that keeps the E.U. together, the values of the Enlightenment — a free press, religious freedom, minority protection, free elections, democracy, a free judiciary independent of all the other branches of government, tolerance, respect for others. I’m afraid the United States might no longer be speaking out for these values. And that makes me very anxious.

    Me too, me too.

    People are talking about civility being lost in politics, sure that's a problem I guess. But my main concern is the post-truth era. I mean ffs, we are post reason now? Is this the end of the enlightenment? I don't understand how the world did not grind to a halt in disgust when Kelly Anne Conway started talking about Alternate Facts.

    I don't care if you are Conservative or Centrist or Liberal, can we all not agree that facts are a real thing which have value?

    9 votes
    1. spctrvl
      Link Parent
      I couldn't agree more. People talk about civility a lot, but I think the fundamental reason it's being lost is that it's becoming increasingly difficult to have rational political discussions when...

      I couldn't agree more. People talk about civility a lot, but I think the fundamental reason it's being lost is that it's becoming increasingly difficult to have rational political discussions when a growing number of people just live in different worlds. Political echo chambers have always existed to an extent, but before the rise of Fox News and more recently facebook filter bubbles and the like, there was at least a basic consensus on reality. That didn't mean there was political consensus, but you didn't have shit happening like the large-scale denial of basic facts, or recorded video, or news media, or any of the countless such things perpetrated by republicans today.

      If you can't agree on stuff as basic as that, you're just going to end up arguing past one another, and no matter how civil you're trying to be, that's not only deeply frustrating but unproductive. To use a math analogy, it's like comparing the validity of two proofs using mutually exclusive axioms, it just doesn't work.

      4 votes
  2. Silbern
    Link
    As a dual citizen of both America and Germany, the conflict between the two breaks my heart. I always thought of both of them as model examples of enlightened values, and while the US is...

    As a dual citizen of both America and Germany, the conflict between the two breaks my heart. I always thought of both of them as model examples of enlightened values, and while the US is disintgregating, Germany isn't far off either. While the situation isn't as dire, I'm genuinely worried by the rise of the AFD (far right), and what will happen if they keep gaining power. It doesn't help that right next door, Poland is increasingly turning into an authoritarian dictatorship under our eyes :/ and we don't need to forget Turkey's fall either. Once we add a potentially massive recession into this, I believe we're sitting at the top of a hill, and it's downhill from here for the near future...

    4 votes