1641

How about some proof or at least a study for the counter-assertion that a person’s character and/or political views are utterly unaffected by the events that shape the world they grow up in?

1642

I’m not saying that anyone else is a douche. Just you.

Doubling down when called on his made-up claims? Check.

And you miss the point once again. Too busy sharing wisdom from your 30 years walking this earth, I suppose.

1643

Ahahahahaha yesssssssssss

I don’t think you’re dumb because of your age, Andy!

1644

Ahhh, their “character.” I like how you changed it from political views to “character.”

That’s funny, too, because age doesn’t mean much of anything for a person’s “character” either.

Uh, no. I wasn’t saying “Someone who lived through the Cuban Missile Crisis automatically knows more about the Cuban Missile Crisis than someone who didn’t”. I was saying that someone’s political views - be they regarding parties or individuals or nations - will be different if they’ve lived through multiple experiences like the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Wall Street Crash, and 9/11 than someone who basically grew up in a 9/11 world and has no other frame of reference.

Man, growing up with different experiences molds peoples perceptions of things!

I’m glad all you were doing was stating the braindead obvious shit that everyone already knows. Because it would have been completely silly for you to say that those events pushed someone over the edge into a certain political affiliation simply for having been alive when they occurred.

Christ, there are people roughly my age who have no concept of British politics prior to Tony Blair. Those who lived through the Thatcher era tend to approach things rather differently…

And there are those that don’t approach things rather differently so who gives a fuck and why even bother assuming what approach they’ll take before you talk with them, other than to be a close-minded asshole?

Ridiculous.

Oh there it is. Proof will set you free! Proof has nothing to do with this shit, you don’t need proof. The argument that you can assume what someone’s political affiliation or outlook will be based on their age is bullshit, and all LK can do at this moment is look like an even bigger asshole than he was in the first place. The supporters of his comment at this point have gone back to trolling Andy, which makes it pretty fucking obvious why they supported it in the first place.

1645

Andy Bates’ arguments are old as fuck.

1646

I’m ok with that, coming from you.

Doubling down when called on his made-up claims? Check.

You haven’t called anything. I don’t see any proof to the contrary.

And you miss the point once again. Too busy sharing wisdom from your 30 years walking this earth, I suppose.

Clearly. So is that an age related slur I detect there? Call the thread police!

I can’t help it if I strive to be number one. It must be all of my rugged individualism coming to the fore. The very notion that you’re actually supporting that age is a non-variable in shaping a person’s ideas or providing information on how to perceive them should give you a hint as to just how twisted over you’ve become in this misguided vendetta. And for what? It’s been clear from the moment I mentioned it that I never meant “age is the only variable”, which is the strawman you’ve been writing love poems to for pages now.

The supporters of his comment at this point have gone back to trolling Andy, which makes it pretty fucking obvious why they supported it in the first place.

I’d like to note that I correctly labeled what you were doing white knighting pages back. I can’t wait to see what twisted fruit this combination bears in the future. The sky’s the limit.

1647

“How they see the world” was the phrase we were arguing over earlier. Please don’t accuse me of something I’ve not done.

I’m glad all you were doing was stating the braindead obvious shit that everyone already knows. Because it would have been completely silly for you to say that those events pushed someone over the edge into a certain political affiliation simply for having been alive when they occurred.

I never, ever, ever claimed that a person’s age would determine their political affiliation. Political views covers a very broad spectrum and is party-agnostic. Funny how you’ve now changed it from “completely useless” to “stating the obvious”, though.

why even bother assuming what approach they’ll take before you talk with them, other than to be a close-minded asshole?

Jesus fucking Christ on a stick, Pogo! How many times do I have to say that I’m not advocating making assumptions about people based on their age, just that age should not ignored as a contributing factor in whatever their personal beliefs and views are founded on. I am not LK, so if you want an argument with him then have an argument with him - don’t assign his comments to me. You made a statement about how age was completely useless and I disagreed.

Oh there it is. Proof will set you free! Proof has nothing to do with this shit, you don’t need proof.

It was a glib response to Lorini request for proof, FFS. It works both ways.

The argument that you can assume what someone’s political affiliation or outlook will be based on their age is bullshit

Find the person that said that and argue with them.

1648

I only passively skimmed your post to try to find a word or phrase that highlighted your continued crusade of championing your own self-importance, as if other people are the ones trolling you. I think this will do.

Dude, don’t just tacitly agree with LK, then.

1649

Why do you appeal to authority when you know exactly how limited his statement is and could easily verify it by thinking about it for a moment? I get that you think I crossed some line in the sand because you imagined an argument neither I or anyone else here made, but at some point you’ve got to cut your losses. Or at least not take it out on other people.

1650

I only passively skimmed
passively skimmed
passively

1651

Oh yeah LK, you win. Andy Bates has managed to look more reasonable than you, but you’re the winner, trust me.

1652

Despite me outright calling what he said stupid? You can do a lot better than that, Pogo.

1653

To think, none of this would have been possible if it wasn’t for your uncanny ability to generate an artificially overstated argument to wrestle with for pages.

1654

Do what? I got LK to admit that what he said wasn’t what he was actually “implying,” that what he meant should have been obvious, and to also completely strawman himself. It’s actually pretty nice. This white armor I’m wearing is fucking awesome.

Nope, never said that. Political affiliation does not equal age. You lose.

It’s been clear from the moment I mentioned it that I never meant “age is the only variable”, which is the strawman you’ve been writing love poems to for pages now.

lol, so much lose from an inane hypocrite. F5F5F5F5F5

1655

Awesome. Next time you want a fight with LK, have a fight with LK from the off.

1656

EXCUSE ME but I wasn’t even talking to you. Take your wound-up windbag fifty gazillion word paragraphs elsewhere.

*If you come back with a reply that’s more than 150 characters long I’m not reading it.

JM if the question is “does experience change a person’s thoughts or opinions?” that’s pretty obvious. What I’m saying is that their opinion on any given issue shouldn’t be given extra weight just because they experienced it. I got into an argument with a black friend of mine who was born in the '30’s. She tried to claim that I couldn’t talk about Jim Crow because I hadn’t experienced it and she had. After about an hour’s discussion she realized/admitted that while she had experienced Jim Crow that doesn’t in and of itself make her opinion about Jim Crow more truthful than my studying of Jim Crow and the effect it had on black people.

Anything else and you have a situation where we can’t learn (as much) from history if we don’t experience it. Another friend of mine is a Civil War buff. I will assert that he knows a lot more about the typical Civil War than the Confederate/North soldier who got his leg blown off in the fighting.

1657

Wasn’t your fault. You were making a point about age and experiences, LK jumped on that thinking that’s what I was arguing, because he can’t be arsed to actually understand what’s going on during his tirades.

1658

Agreed. That’s something I tried to make clear I wasn’t claiming. Apparently I didn’t do a very good job of this! However, I do think it’s pretty likely that living through the experience is likely to have a stronger effect on how their views are formulated than having only studied it - it’s far more personal.

1659

That’s over a 1000 characters! Outrageous!

You can assert those things, but you’re arguing something definitively when it’s a moving target. You can infer some things from age and experience accurately, and sometimes you’ll be wrong. You’re excused.

1660

I think this is one of the core misunderstandings, here. Balanced against the earlier

Again, I’m not lumping anyone into a preconceived model in this situation. Andy’s earned his reputation just as we all have, and while it’s surely an incomplete portrait it’s got depth even if he doesn’t. All I did was cross-reference that with the sort of generalizations you speak of in your first paragraph there (although unlike what you and JM are apparently discussing, I wasn’t focused on the political affiliation so much as the rigidity of beliefs and aggressive zealotry on behalf of provably untrue things) when the information about his general age came to light, and then be surprised at the outcome. You know, much as you apparently were when you saw young conservatives, except in my case my college experience took place right in the heart of a young conservative movement nationwide, which is precisely the sort of thing that had seemed to apply all of this time. Then I used it to make fun of Andy.

Now I think what happened is that this triggered the allergic reaction we sometimes have to having personal information used in an argument, and I accept that this is a reasonable response even if I don’t think my particular example crosses any boundaries that weren’t left behind ages ago. I probably wouldn’t have even registered the age had he not used it in some weird sort of age-measuring contest against another poster, but I did, and I thought it was funny, and the rest is history.

Now, beyond that, I’m sorry if I was rude to you off the bat with respect to my opinions of your strange (to me) ethical boundaries in terms of what’s fair play in P&R. This back and forth is pointless.