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What happened in 2023 that will have an impact on the rest of the decade?
Things that come to mind for me:
- Israel and Gaza
- The rise of Ozempic and other similar medications
- Artificial Intelligence
What do you all think?
The unprecedented startling and continuing increase in ocean temperature this year. This is probably the most impactful event of our lifetimes (thus far).
Oh man, the rest of the decade and thereafter is so f'd.
It’s more evidence for climate change, but are there practical implications of that specifically?
Weaker shells for most critters that rely on them.
Coral reefs and any related ecosystems were nice while they lasted.
The possible collapse of the NA current would make life in Europe real 'interesting'.
Do you have a chart? I agree that it’s a problem but did it accelerate so much last year?
https://vxtwitter.com/EliotJacobson/status/1741835451408015648
Here is a graph for the North Atlantic. Its grim.
Wow, that's a big variance.
Is this due to the reduction of sulphates in the ocean transporters fuel? I had read that while good to remove had this unforeseen side effect.
I think that might be one of the reasons. Iv not been paying much attention to oceans temperature specifically. Kinda just watching it rise.
I believe there’s three main theories:
None of these are mutually exclusive, and it’s possible it’s the confluence of all three occurring at the same time is what caused such a significant shift.
Cheers for the info. I'm gonna make s note of this. Since you mentioned el nino. It seems we are I for a particularly bad one this year from what iv seen.
Agree on one and two. I think three is going to be less impactful than we think; I suspect in the next year or two we’ll see a major corporation lose a lot of money (or go bankrupt) over AI-generated information being incorrect (think about the legal citations and scientific references that have been wrong), and companies become more cautious about AI.
To contribute to the list, I’ll add:
In terms of AI, I think there’s a lot to learn from the rise of the internet and the dot-com-bubble. The internet was a major shift but it took time and couldn’t be forced the way people tried to. So yes, an AI crash is likely but it’s too obvious a working technology with concrete use cases to just fizzle away. So there will be something at the end and it will be major. Since trends generally accelerate I’d say this will be years in the making but not decades. I wouldn’t dare to say where the big shifts and money lie with AI in the end but I’d be surprised if it didn’t have a major impact.
Also an important lesson from the rise of the internet: Having all the information in the world at their fingertips didn’t make people much smarter as a whole.
This is the sort of thing that is hard to measure and I don't have any concrete data on it, but I feel like sort of both can be true at the same time. The connected internet has just also made everyone, including the "dumb" ones, ability to speak their minds about everything. Before the internet became widespread, we mostly saw people in traditional media such as television and newspapers, which was usually people more knowledgeable in their field. We didn't see everyone else like we do now. But the internet has also brought access to knowledge for billions of people around the world that maybe barely had access to a proper library before in poorer countries. So on a global scale, I definitely think the internet has made us smarter as a whole, but all the stupidity that still exists is just much more visible than previously.
I do agree that any AI boom will most likely resemble the Dotcom Bubble. To clarify, I wasn’t discussing someone like OpenAI going bankrupt. I was talking about a non-AI (and probably non-tech) firm, say a major health insurance company, running AI software that either accidentally leaks a large amount of data, or hallucinates something defamatory that gets them sued.
It could be as simple as not finding a quick path to make it useful/profitable.
I watched this 2001 dot-com bubble documentary, Startup.com, and even knowing how it ends you can absolutely understand people investing in the idea. The internet is obviously huge, so let’s put services on the internet (the protagonist made a website for revenue collection for governments). But nobody had an idea of how that looks concretely, as a real-world implementation. There barely was the tech but there certainly wasn’t the experience, the conventions, the training. It failed because it was an idea but not a product. I’m sure there’s a billion dollar company providing this service now but it’s built upon so much trail-and-error and pain.
When I see AI implantations today it feels very similar. “Let’s throw AI at it!” But there’s no fully fleshed out use case, no way to make it do exactly what you want and people are still skeptical. Companies will try it out as a fad, people will get disillusioned with the real-world limitations and way later, in unexpected ways there will emerge a great set of functionalities and rules that actually makes sense.
Can totally relate to the last point. Seen it at my own company with an idea to get AI to handle our customer support. After several months of testing, turns out it is only "decent" at answering questions that are more or less already covered in our help section on our website. But most customers need support for something more specific related to their account and data. Giving an AI bot full read/write access to our database is an entirely different beast to implement (which we are definitely NOT doing).
There's a glimmer of hope in the Caucasus, I want to think. Both countries seem legitimately interested in a final peace deal. Azerbaijan seems hesitant to push the issue further, and Armenia seems to recognise that it can't militarily reverse the loss. With a final peace deal and a Western guarantee of Armenian security in Armenia proper, maybe things settle down. There's still the matter of resettling 120k refugees, but perhaps EU accession funds could help towards that.
Rolling back of Roe v Wade. In some states it will continue to create more economic disparity, creating more uneducated reactionary people. It will contribute to more socio-economical issues. It also signifies the erosion of the power of the judicial institution which will have further catastrophic impact on the American brand of "democracy". I couldn't give less of a shit about institutions of power, but the issues that removing women's bodily autonomy will create for future prospects of this country are frightening
Sadly, I also expect the crime rate to spike in 16–18 years. Unwanted children by uninvested parents: what else would society expect?
Speaking locally, 2023 was a watershed moment in Ireland for the awareness of violent anti-immigration extremists, mainly because of the riot in Dublin City in October but also a string of arson and knife attacks. The reaction has mostly been disgust but a few of the most unscrupulous politicians have begun pandering to them which is concerning. I think it's going to be a big ongoing issue for the rest of the decade, either in dealing with them as the organised extremist group that they are, or seeing them become entrenched into a MAGA-style paranoiac political movement with a thin veneer of legitimacy on top. It's been the tipping point of a profoundly sad social trend.
This is a good point that nobody raised, I guess most people commenting are from the US. In the EU, the right wing parties are gaining ground pretty much in all countries. In some countries, the polls show them in second or third place.
I think it's going to get worse since in the next 2 years we will have elections in a lot of countries. Some of the rethorics of these politicians is mind blowing and what the propose. Also most of the parties have ties in one way or the other with Russia, which gets you thinking.
At the same time, I can kind of understand why people vote for them. Until a few years ago, no politician had the courage to open their mouth when it came to immigration, it would have been a political suicide so instead they pushed it further under the rug. Now, in many countries we end up with "refugees" which are not really refugees but economic migrants and the worst is they have an innate disgust for the local laws and traditions.
We need to hit the brakes on that and the right wingers will thin out. I am pro-immigration but done through the proper channels. I am pro refugees but the ones that really flee from real danger. I am against the "I came here by boat, now give me money. I lost my passport at sea but I still have my phone" type of refugee.
This is the kind of stuff I mean by "a MAGA-style paranoiac political movement with a thin veneer of legitimacy on top". You're framing it like you also want to stop the far right, meanwhile pushing the exact same talking points as the far-right:
So not only are you casually throwing out the same racist stereotype of refugees as the far-right, your plan to counter them is to... do the policies they want us to do. How about we stop a minute and think about why there's been a rise in xenophobic violence, instead of just swallowing the racists' framing without question?
Are people mad about foreigners, or are they mad because of the rental crisis or the cost of living crisis or crime, and just blaming it on foreigners? (Quite a lot, probably). Are immigrants and asylum seekers even in the top five factors contributing to any of those problems? (No). So if we squander a bunch of political energy to kick a bunch of foreigners out and all those economic problems remain, will those people still be angry and searching for scapegoats? (Probably). And would that political energy have been better spent making the government take action on the various crises? (Yes). Does part of that action involve increasing housing supply, for which we would need more tradesmen in the country? (YES). So would anti-immigration policies have the potential to make the real issues driving anger WORSE, leading to a vicious cycle? (Maybe, I'm not an economist).
Or, are people mad about foreigners because a facebook group convinced them that they're part of a globalist conspiracy? Because that's full-on extremism at that point, some reasoned debate and a few policy concessions is not going to make someone stop believing the lizard people run the world. There's been enough firebombings in the last year that the Gardaí should be monitoring them to intercept attacks, and locking them up.
I have to come back to this again because I'm really disgusted to run into crap like this on Tildes:
You should be ashamed of yourself offering up stereotypes like this as though it had any place in talk of politics. Nothing but a rotten image cooked up in a racist imagination. I don't care if you saw a rude and entitled refugee in the street once, the suggestion that this characterises a number of people large enough to be a policy consideration is completely absurd.
A lot of text for little context. I don't frequent any groups or follow any conspiracy theorists. I already told you that I would never vote for any right wingers for they are either loonies, financed by Russia, or both.
I am not ashamed of anything, this is how I feel about it and I will not apologize for it. I see myself as a center-leftist but I am against uncontrolled immigration. Full stop. You are free to think whatever you want about me.
I've never met an apologist who wasn't a shameless apologist, so that doesn't surprise me. Shameless enough to get in one more alt-right strawman: ""uncontrolled immigration"", very nice. You could run for the national party, you have every one of their talking points down.
It is valid to be both pro-immigration and wanting to reform and control immigration.
Survey data does show that immigrants have social attitudes that are significantly misaligned with the general social attitudes of their host country.
A survey of 1,000 British Muslims by Channel 4 had disturbing findings:
There are many positives like:
It is not a figment of imagination or internet misinformation or propaganda that some part of past and current immigration policy was/is deeply flawed.
I think past moderate and liberal establishment denial that there was nothing wrong, everything was a-okay, and if there were any problems then those problems laid in the host societies' faults, has provoked the current reactionary backlash which demands acknowledgment of the issue.
One of my good friends, an Egyptian software engineer who immigrated to the Netherlands, volunteered to teach classes for refugees there. I distinctly remember him telling me how he went into it with hopes of empowering fellow ME immigrants like himself but came out so disillusioned by the experience because so many of his students had zero interest in adapting to their host country.
I think there are many people who like and welcome immigrants but want somewhat tighter controls and protocols to better ensure that their countries admit immigrants who are motivated to integrate and succeed.
For what it's worth, 4% is roughly the Lizardman constant, which is the proportion of any survey who will say the most absurd thing that cannot even be true. Anything below 5% in a survey like this is usually a good proxy for "nobody". For the other questions, I suspect you'd get similar results by asking the same things of practising British Christians. Keep in mind that the legalisation of homosexuality in the UK happened within living memory, and a number of MPs voted for Section 28.
That said, I agree that we have to be able to have serious conversations about this stuff without accusing each other of racism.
Do you even understand how perfectly you are proving my point, when I say that people are skipping past the question of "what is driving right-wing arson attacks?" and assuming immigration is the cause, and then you reply with an entire essay about only immigration? Zero mention of the rental crisis, cost of living, wage stagnation, crime, anything? Just starting from your conclusion and working backwards to justify it. The understanding that people scapegoat immigrants for economic problems is widely known and very easy to understand, so your anxious avoidance of the idea is conspicuous.
I think that you assert these things as unassailable facts with the assumption that immigration is categorically separate from economic issues, and draw moral boundaries along the acceptance or rejection of those assertions for people to fall on one or the other side thereof.
It is quite arguable that immigration is inextricably tied with contemporary economic issues. In fact, that's the big philosophical question that politicians and economists are trying to grok: global labor arbitrage. It may be the true political meta-issue upon which all issues dance: if the power of all market entities (labor, consumers, corporations, etc.) is determined by their leverage or supply-and-demand within their respective markets, which are separated by natural barriers (geographic distance and terrain) and artificial barriers (regulation as well as regulatory capture, tariffs, etc.) and historically have been so, then what happens when those barriers begin to dissolve? Especially at a radically quickening pace thanks to technological progress.
It is too simplistic to boil it all down to "racism". Immigration is a sub-question of the big question about how the human race, long separated by mountains and oceans and woes and fortunes, now suddenly sees those barriers dismantled and has to deal with the messy process of global social, political, cultural, economic, and industrial integration: globalization.
You think wrong. I did not say anything like that.
Most of your comment is justifying reasons why immigration could be a contributing factor, but because you refuse to do any similar analysis for other potential causes, or try to compare the impact of immigration vs the impact of any other factors at all, or even mention the other factors, you are just starting from a conclusion and looking for evidence to justify it.
This is very bad argumentation: you will never find the important answers if you only look for proof that you were right all along.
Good thing I didn't do that then. I said the characterisation of refugees as opportunists who lie to claim government welfare is a racist stereotype. Which it is. If you have ever seen an truly open racist talk about refugees you know this is true. Discussions about immigration are not automatically racist, but throwing around stereotypes is, and so is diverting discussions to focus entirely on immigration to the exclusion of all else, especially when you haven't established it is even a significant cause. The far-right violence really got going during the anti-masker protests, so asserting there aren't other significant factors seems very reckless.
In your reply to @honzabe
Your point is that there is no clear line between the far-right movement in Europe and immigration and that such a line cannot be reliably drawn, and that one's eagerness to draw it is suspect.
You argue that you don't know the root cause of the problem, yet you seem quite certain that it's not an immigration issue and are arguing down its possibility. So what do you think is the root cause?
This is that discussion.
I have not asserted that are not other significant factors. I have only asserted immigration as a factor. You are asserting that it is either not a factor or cannot be ascertained as a factor.
Immigration is one side of modern globalization, which is being driven by technological and political advances. My recent point is that global labor arbitrage is an economic aspect of globalization; my previous point was that sociocultural clashing is another aspect. Many (most? all?) European far-right parties have anti-globalist positions to reinforce those dissolving barriers that once separated societies and markets.
In addition, these far-right parties and their politicians have drawn these connections themselves by explicitly adopting anti-immigrant, Eurosceptic, and anti-globalist positions; an increasing number of Europeans seem to agree to some degree by voting for them.
Are the lines the far-right explicitly draws from immigration to their thoughts not the same lines that are drawn to their actions?
Yet in your replies to @OrangeCorvus:
To say that someone should be ashamed requires a moral reference. You have drawn moral boundaries here.
I read into this your treatment of immigration and economics issues as being separate, unless your intention is different and you do think that they are connected.
I'm only engaging because I am genuinely curious about your point of view. But you need to be clear and not engage in ad hominem arguments with other users.
OP did not generalize, acknowledged that some refugees "flee from real danger", expressed support for them, just pointed out what they see as a problematic side of the equation with some immigrants. You accused the OP of "casually throwing out the same racist stereotype of refugees", told them to be ashamed and claimed about their opinion that you are "really disgusted to run into crap like this".
I think this is how right-wing parties win.
Some people are legitimate refugees, some are not. Some respect the host country, some do not. Some cause problems. Problems are felt by the locals and they try to talk about them and solve them. They are subsequently shouted down by people like you.
As if the refugees or dark-skinned people could never cause any problems. As if it could be safely assumed that every time such a problem is mentioned, it is only because the one mentioning it is a bigoted racist asshole. The possibility that the problem is real does not even need to be considered, no argumentation is necessary.
A voter is suffering from real problems, like for example living near a ghetto of immigrants ruled by criminal gangs. The voter knows, that people who deny the mere existence of those problems will not solve them. Who else is there? Right-wing parties.
People like you are making right-wing parties win.
BTW, I do not agree with everything OP says. For example, I do not believe there is such a thing as "innate disgust for the local laws and traditions" - but I know that if I want to discuss that, I have to argue. I cannot just use some negative labels and be done with it. That would be disrespectful to the OP and intellectually lazy.
OP thought the characterisation of refugees was relevant enough that it should be mentioned twice, in a discussion that is about the alt-right and not directly about immigration. You can pretend that's a normal thing to do if you like.
I note that of the three defensive replies I got, nobody so much as mentioned the bulk of my point, which is that immigrants are being scapegoated for the economic problems which historically have been the driving factor behind extremist movements. The fact that none of you was willing to even acknowledge that point, that all of you anxiously avoided mentioning the majority of my comment, and would only mention immigration, that's the right-wing point of view. The right-wing parties don't want that question discussed because they know they will lose that discussion, so instead they (and you) do everything possible to divert the conversation to immigration, immigration, immigration.
You want to call me intellectually lazy while pretending most of my point didn't even exist. What's driving the public anger? What problems are the right wing appealing to? Why are you afraid of discussing these questions? I mean with evidence-based unbiased sources, not some fun facts about immigration and no other cause is even considered. They certainly aren't questions the right-wing parties seem to want explored, so surely you, who is apparently concerned about the rise of the far-right, should want to look into that, right?
It's funny because not addressing the economic (cyclical) crisis while using immigrants as scapegoat is exactly the modus operandi we already seen before plenty of times. More recently Bolsonaro and Trump... I will not even mention Hitler to not put some people in the defensive here.
The world belongs to everybody. It's time to stop repeating the same thing expecting different results.
But yes, fascism ascends in times like these if the left isn't organized enough.
Exactly. If you legitimize the framing of extremism as an immigration problem, but the people remain angry because their conditions still didn't improve... then you have a mainstreamed xenophobic political movement with an arm of conspiratorial extremists willing to do violence. Very dangerous.
All right, let's discuss this claim. Let's assume "the world belongs to everybody" - how would you implement it in practical terms? If you were a world leader for a year, what would you do to achieve that? And I am interested in immigration specifically - would you keep borders and visa systems and regulations? Would you allow anyone move anywhere they want? And what consequences would you expect as a result of your decision?
I won't discuss an hypothetical that will never happen because you're nitpicking. You can just cut that sentence out of my post and it stays the same.
Capitalism is in crisis, it is cyclical, it will keep happening until we overcome it. It was and never is because of immigrants. It isn't the case here in Brazil, isn't in USA, isn't in Japan, isn't in Argentina and it wasn't the problem in Nazi Germany. Each country has different politics on immigration.
Cultures change, people walk the earth, nothing is immutable.
You criticize the way the world works - anyone can do that. To even attempt to fix something, you have to suggest a specific solution. That's why I asked how you would implement it. I have heard too many things that sound beautiful as an abstract idea but quickly fall apart when you start thinking about the details... like how to achieve social cohesion when there is a big influx of people. How not to overwhelm the school system, health system, and social system, which all have limited capacity and a limited amount of money. How to solve housing. How to prevent ghettos and parallel cultures. And many more. Maybe if you started thinking about those details, you would realize that certain limits on immigration might be a pragmatic thing. And maybe you would have found good arguments and changed my opinion. We'll never know.
Recently, there was a discussion about whether Tildes is "very left leaning" or not. I cannot find it right now, unfortunately, but there was a comment I liked that said something in the sense that there is a group that acts as if the battle of ideas was won, they have opinions that are certifiably right and those who disagree are bigots, racists, and generally bad people.
That's the problem with your comments. You automatically assume certain things (immigrants are scapegoated, something is driving public anger) and you write as if they were somehow doubtless facts and the only possible explanation that anyone disagrees is that they are certainly "MAGA" or racist or whatever.
Do you ever consider that maybe, just maybe, sometimes (not always) there are immigrants who are the problem? And maybe not necessarily because they are bad people, just because there is too much of them and some small country is not able to absorb them without serious disruptions? Or maybe because they are from a culture that is in some aspects incompatible with local culture? That there is no scapegoating or anything - just people pointing out a problem that actually exists and is actually caused by immigration?
And let me be clear, I am not claiming it is like that. I am literally asking, whether you consider it, whether it is even "thinkable" for you. Do you try to construct counter-arguments, or do you think it is just so obviously wrong that no discussion is even needed?
What points? I only see assumptions and some negative labels. Can you quote where exactly you actually make a point that somehow supports your claims? The way I see it, you basically claim that problems are caused by factors external to immigrants, and you discard the theory that some problems are indeed caused by immigrants as being "MAGA" or racist and you make no effort to prove or argue why this is actually the case.
Let me be very specific here - for example the comment by @OrangeCorvus that you quote...
What is your stance on this claim? Do you believe people like that do not exist? Do you believe they do exist but they cannot possibly be causing any problems? Or what specifically do you believe about that quote? And most importantly - what evidence or arguments do you have that support your belief? And let me remind you labeling someone as "MAGA" is neither evidence nor argument.
And BTW, I was one of those East-European immigrants that flooded the UK when they opened the door. And I totally get that this caused some problems for some people (influx of cheap labor in some sectors etc.) and those people absolutely do have the right to voice their concerns and it does not make them bigots or racists - it is my duty to give them arguments and not just some nasty labels.
And don't assume that I am right-leaning. I actually really dislike right-wing parties that are currently on the rise, and I am writing all of this not only because I dislike ideological thinking, but because I think people like you are pushing voters in the middle towards the right-wing parties and when they win, my life gets shittier. Because those voters might have real problems that immigration is causing... that you basically just deny with ideological thinking. People don't like it when they suffer and instead of helping, you tell them "nah, you are just a bigot" - when you do that, they usually vote for your political opponent.
And to be absolutely clear, I am not claiming that racism does not exist, scapegoating never happens, nothing like that. I am just saying that if I think something is scapegoating or racism, I have to argue why I think that is the case. It is not the only possible explanation, the discussion was not won once for all and I cannot just boldly state that it is that way and if you see it differently, you are a racist.
Allow me to spell out what my below quote is suggesting:
Claim 1: people have jumped to discussing the far-right arson attacks as exclusively an immigration-caused issue without stopping to figure out if this is actually correct. Your own replies continuing to be laser-focused on immigration and nothing else is a good example of how this happens.
Claim 2: if you actually want to solve the issue of a violent, growing extremist movement setting buildings on fire around the country, you should actually discuss what the root causes are and what solutions would actually be likely to solve the problem, not just uncritically accept the solution the extremists suggested, literally while they were setting fire to our city
I've argued with progressive people who had some extremely negative characterisations of "the kind of people who were setting the fires", which I won't repeat here, and I've rightfully called that characterisation classist. It remains a fact that the best answers come from an analysis of relevant facts, not from emotive nonsense like injecting charicatures of the different groups involved into the discussion. Unproductive picture painting will be called out, not to dismiss points but because they are not points, they're emotion. If that upsets you I am not sorry.
I think you are still missing my point. English is not my native language so I probably do not express myself clearly enough. Let's try one last time. You say...
... and I absolutely agree - but you are not doing that! Because what the root causes are has not been settled. That's what this discussion is about. You are just stating your opinion of what the root cause of the problem is - but that is not making a point.
The way I see the situation: There are two people. One of them (@OrangeCorvus) believes the root of the problem might be caused by X and Y. The other person (you) is saying - no, the cause is X and who says Y is a racist. But that is not making a point, that is just stating your opinion (and feelings about the people who have a different opinion). Making a point would require stating "I believe that the cause of the problem is only X and never Y, because..." followed by some evidence or arguments to support your claim. That is what making a point means.
The things you mention are obvious (to any reasonable people) - sure, there are racist people who "jumped to discussing the far-right arson attacks as exclusively an immigration-caused issue without stopping to figure out if this is actually correct" - but that is not mutually exclusive with the fact that there might be issues actually caused by immigration. These can be both true. Ironically, you are doing the same thing - you jump to discussing the topic of immigration as an exclusively racism-caused issue without stopping to figure out if this is actually correct.
You cannot assume someone is racist just because they believe immigration causes issues. To be able to assume that, you would first have to prove, that no issues can be ever caused by immigration - then, and only then, you would be able to claim that everyone who is against immigration is racist/bigot/prejudiced. But you never even tried to prove that. You never provided any actual arguments why we should believe that racism/scapegoating is the only case and not the things mentioned by @OrangeCorvus. You just keep repeating what you believe are the causes - but we don't have to believe that. You have to convince us.
And let me be insistent here - one of the things you quoted was this claim:
What is your stance on this? That is one of those things that get votes for right-wing parties in EU. Do you deny that this phenomenon (=economic migrants who abuse asylum system) exists? And let me remind you, this discussion started as a general discussion about immigration, it is not necessarily about the US. So, do you really want to claim that this problem does not actually exist (in Europe) and people who claim it does are all racists?
Yes exactly.
I have actually not stated my opinion on what the root cause of the problem is because I don't know and neither do you. I have stated that people are assuming the root cause is immigration without discussion. I have named some things I think might be contributing, but I don't claim to know for sure. But unless you know for certain the answer is near 100% immigration, it is wrong to talk about it as an immigration issue.
Incorrect. OrangeCorvus directly said that problem is caused by immigration. There is no might. Here is the quote:
Directly saying that reducing immigration will reduce the number of right wingers. It's not me pushing a simple answer here. I showed frustration that so many assume the problem is only caused by immigration.
Nowhere in any of my comments will you find me saying that discussing immigration is racist. Look for a quote, you won't find it. What I say repeatedly is that focusing on immigration and nothing else is the framing that the right wing wants. You should be very careful about focusing where extremists want you to focus, because their reasons probably aren't good.
Now, the thing you are angry about is that I said this:
This is not the same as saying "talking about immigration is racist". I said talk like this has no place in politics. Because firstly it's emotive, not factual. It's not based in any information. It's encouraging the reader to imagine people in a negative way. And secondly this image:
this is a stereotype that racists use to describe immigrants and refugees. I've heard how racists talk and you probably have too. This makes it very emotive in a very negative way.
That's very important to call out! Because solutions to serious problems have to be fact-based, not emotion-based, otherwise nobody can ever agree, it becomes a matter of opinions, some people have a negative image of immigrants, some people have a negative image of the working class, and nobody can ever agree on anything.
So when I see some comment skipping the entire question of causes and going straight to two (!) negative and emotion-based images of immigrants... that's bad politics. That's irresponsible. When we're talking about political violence I think it's important to speak up against stuff like that.
There is a lot of space between what someone means, how they convert it to words, and how those words are interpreted. How you describe your own argumentation in the last comment does not match how I interpreted what you said... but I try to give you the benefit of the doubt, maybe some things got "lost in translation".
I will try to give you honest feedback about how your words can be perceived with the caveat that some of the misperception can be in my head. I think there are values we share, we just have different things that trigger them and different blind spots.
For example, when you say things like this...
I take it that you are a good person who is really trying to be just. A person who knows how emotions cloud judgment and thinks that should be avoided. So, being that person, how do you not see, that when you use labels like "MAGA", racist, or "crap", you are doing exactly that - emotion-based fact-free expression that makes people who disagree defensive and blocks any solution? And I share your belief it's important to call that out - that's why I am calling you out when you are doing it.
And I try to point that out in the spirit of trying to help you see that, not to "win" an argument. Because I certainly have blind spots and sensitive spots. Just different ones. Let me be personal for a moment to convey the feeling that might make my perspective more understandable: I am white. I know racism is bad and I try to understand those hurt by it as much as possible, but there is a limit. I was never personally hurt by racism. On the other hand, I was personally hurt multiple times by people you remind me of, people who fight against racism so passionately they cannot see that not everything about people who happen to have a different race is a racist stereotype.
Example: when I was a kid, I used to spend summers with my grandma. She lived right next to a ghetto where the majority of residents belonged to a certain ethnic group. And there was kind of an initiation ritual that white kids had to go through - getting jumped by a group of older kids from that ethnic group and beaten up, just for fun, five 14-year-olds against one 12-year-old. It happened to me personally and it happened to my friends. And the worst part of it was not the beating - the worst part was knowing you could not talk about it, because people like you would immediately start screaming "racism". It's like a public secret - everyone who lives there knows, but you cannot talk about it outside.
To this day I usually avoid discussing that ethnic group. When it was mentioned here on Tildes, that some people claim the hygiene standards of that group are questionable, it was immediately labeled as a racist stereotype, a remnant of Nazi propaganda, no doubts, no questions asked, although I have seen with my own eyes that their ghettos actually look like this despite being provided (at least initially) the same city services as the rest of the city. I hope you are starting to understand why I am a bit allergic to people who immediately start screaming racism.
Another example: I spent two and a half years of my life in the UK (legally, pre-Brexit). It was great for me. However, I could see that I was part of a large wave of people, and that wave was causing problems for locals, just by the numbers. Too many new immigrants willing to do cheap work (and be honest, wouldn't "they are willing to work for pennies" be also discarded by you as a 'stereotype'?), some local people were pushed out of their profession, life got shittier for them. I believe those problems could have been solved, if they could be discussed openly. However, there was a large group of people who immediately started screaming racism or bigotry when the topic of immigration regulation popped up. So the discussion was either silenced or made so polarized that it was not resolved, and it was part of the reason that Brexit happened.
Brexit is probably as distant experience for you as racism is for me - for me, it is however a bitter personal disillusionment. I think some things cannot be really conveyed by words, but a great artistic portrayal might help - there is a great scene in the movie Brexit: The Uncivil War - a woman tries to voice her personal problems related to immigrants and immediately it is implied that she is racist. She just breaks down crying and I could totally understand that injustice, frustration, and helplessness. That scene almost makes me cry too. And when I read a discussion like this one, I can't help it bud identify her with @OrangeCorvus and the guy who accused her of racism with you.
That certainly affects how I interpret what you say, what parts I pay attention to, and how believable they seem to me. And I am pretty sure that it goes the other way too. For example, when you say.
For someone who does not know, you seem to be way too sure that immigration itself is not at least a part of the cause. Can you not imagine how the totality of what you have written would be perceived by someone, who might have legitimate doubts about immigration?
Here is an example of you misreading me (is my grammar the cause?). Read it again - I am not saying you are saying that "discussing immigration is racist". I am saying that you jump to the opinion that immigration is an exclusively racism-caused issue when discussing the topic of immigration. When someone says something suggesting that immigration itself is the issue, you label it as a stereotype or "crap".
Labeling something as a stereotype is often a way to discard a claim without coming up with actual arguments. The problem is that sometimes - not always - stereotypes have a real core. That is why I keep pushing for your opinion about the claim we end up with "refugees" which are not really refugees but economic migrants because that often gets discarded as a stereotype, and I know from personal experience of people close to me who I trust that this actually happens.
And yet, people simply describing what they've seen with their own eyes are often labeled racists and their experience discarded as a stereotype. And BTW, I have not personally seen "I came here by boat, now give me money. I lost my passport at sea but I still have my phone" type of refugee yet but I have heard enough stories - from people I know, not the media - that it seems pretty plausible and if I had to bet whether this exist of whether it is just a stereotype made up by racists, I would bet it exists. And I would also bet, that some people would label me as a racist just for saying that.
I have stopped responding to that person because I felt like there was no room for having an open discussion. The moment I said something that didn't fit to his world view, I became some sort of archnemesis and then I was named names with which I don't identify. Names which I also can't stand but all of a sudden, I am thrown in the same pot. So much for compassion and understanding. From that brief exchange, I felt like I never accused him of anything, yet I am the "extremist".
Thanks so much for that, it's exactly how I felt. I just gave up trying to engage with him because it felt like it was going nowhere and no matter what I would have said, what arguments I would have brought, it would be turned around and I would be accused of something. I reached an age where I don't have the time and patience for things like that.
#3 for me. It didn't fully happen in 2023, but I think generative AI really took a big upswing in 2023, and that is something that's going to continue (in its current form) to be very central to our lives for most of the next decade.
Nothing of significance. The valuations game is a worrying trend but it only saw an increase in 2023, the presence was always there. Nevertheless, it won't be that decade changing thing if it sees a sharp correction which I totally expect to see in this new year.