are you tired of hearing about moderate heroism?

[WalterMitty]

yes

[Keystone Phil]

Well, yeah, but I'm even more tired of moderate heroism in practice.

[Lunar]

moderate hero = any pragmatic argument I disagree with (at least lately)

[The Ex-Factor]

There's this one guy I know who's like a real life Evan Bayh. Whenever we talk politics he always tries to take the moderate position because he "doesn't want to be too partisan".

You must be logged in to read this quote.

And he ended up trying to convince me about the merits of intelligent design. Which would be okay if he didn't do this every time - during the bailout he said he supported it but wanted to cut some parts out just because he sympathized with the Republican view of keeping deficits under control. Guy needs to stop waffling and pick a side some time.

So yes moderate heroism sucks.

[Countess Anya of the North Parish]

yes.

[Associate Justice PiT]

There's this one guy I know who's like a real life Evan Bayh. Whenever we talk politics he always tries to take the moderate position because he "doesn't want to be too partisan".

You must be logged in to read this quote.

And he ended up trying to convince me about the merits of intelligent design. Which would be okay if he didn't do this every time - during the bailout he said he supported it but wanted to cut some parts out just because he sympathized with the Republican view of keeping deficits under control. Guy needs to stop waffling and pick a side some time.

So yes moderate heroism sucks.

     That person is guilty of a classic appeal to moderation. I remember the classic example of this: Tom wants to kill all puppies. Richard wants to kill no puppies. Jim suggests killing 50% of puppies as a compromise.

     Glad I don't know anyone like that in real life.

[Lunar]

There's this one guy I know who's like a real life Evan Bayh. Whenever we talk politics he always tries to take the moderate position because he "doesn't want to be too partisan".

You must be logged in to read this quote.

And he ended up trying to convince me about the merits of intelligent design. Which would be okay if he didn't do this every time - during the bailout he said he supported it but wanted to cut some parts out just because he sympathized with the Republican view of keeping deficits under control. Guy needs to stop waffling and pick a side some time.

So yes moderate heroism sucks.

     That person is guilty of a classic appeal to moderation. I remember the classic example of this: Tom wants to kill all puppies. Richard wants to kill no puppies. Jim suggests killing 50% of puppies as a compromise.

     Glad I don't know anyone like that in real life.

Libertarians want to kill puppies?  I knew that Barr guy was a sick fuck.  just look at him




puppykiller

[Associate Justice PiT]

There's this one guy I know who's like a real life Evan Bayh. Whenever we talk politics he always tries to take the moderate position because he "doesn't want to be too partisan".

You must be logged in to read this quote.

And he ended up trying to convince me about the merits of intelligent design. Which would be okay if he didn't do this every time - during the bailout he said he supported it but wanted to cut some parts out just because he sympathized with the Republican view of keeping deficits under control. Guy needs to stop waffling and pick a side some time.

So yes moderate heroism sucks.

     That person is guilty of a classic appeal to moderation. I remember the classic example of this: Tom wants to kill all puppies. Richard wants to kill no puppies. Jim suggests killing 50% of puppies as a compromise.

     Glad I don't know anyone like that in real life.

Libertarians want to kill puppies?  I knew that Barr guy was a sick fuck.  just look at him




puppykiller

     I think that was supposed to be funny except I don't really get it.

[Lunar]

ouch.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

There's this one guy I know who's like a real life Evan Bayh. Whenever we talk politics he always tries to take the moderate position because he "doesn't want to be too partisan".

You must be logged in to read this quote.

And he ended up trying to convince me about the merits of intelligent design. Which would be okay if he didn't do this every time - during the bailout he said he supported it but wanted to cut some parts out just because he sympathized with the Republican view of keeping deficits under control. Guy needs to stop waffling and pick a side some time.

So yes moderate heroism sucks.

     That person is guilty of a classic appeal to moderation. I remember the classic example of this: Tom wants to kill all puppies. Richard wants to kill no puppies. Jim suggests killing 50% of puppies as a compromise.

     Glad I don't know anyone like that in real life.

You just summed up the "Middle Ground Fallacy" rather perfectly. The very basis of Moderate Heroism.

Before the Civil War, a Moderate Hero in the US would be for keeping slavery, just not allowing it in more territories. It could brutally continue where it already was.

In Nazi Germany, a Moderate Hero would simply be in favor of forced explusion of all Jews, rather than Genocide of them.

In pre-colonial India, a Moderate Hero would be for just allowing sati under SOME circumstances, not all the time. And would be for keeping the caste system, not just enforcing it too brutally.

In apartheid South Africa, a Moderate Hero would be for keeping blacks as second-class citizens instead of the even more brutal treatment. Actually this has a basis in reality, the much deservedly demonized P.W. Botha took a Moderate Hero-esque policy toward apartheid, South Africa in the 80s was a bit laxer than South Africa in the 60s. I suppose that made it a great compromise

I find it funny me and Phil agree so strongly on this. Actually if anything that just proves how right it is.

[Kaine for Senate '18]

Yes, yes, 1,000 times yes.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

Moderate heros would have loved "centrist" parties like the Catholic Centre party, which enabled Hitler. Only the Socialists and the Communists opposed Hitler.

[Ebowed]

moderate hero = any pragmatic argument I disagree with (at least lately)

Moderate Hero much?

[Gustaf]

There's this one guy I know who's like a real life Evan Bayh. Whenever we talk politics he always tries to take the moderate position because he "doesn't want to be too partisan".

You must be logged in to read this quote.

And he ended up trying to convince me about the merits of intelligent design. Which would be okay if he didn't do this every time - during the bailout he said he supported it but wanted to cut some parts out just because he sympathized with the Republican view of keeping deficits under control. Guy needs to stop waffling and pick a side some time.

So yes moderate heroism sucks.

     That person is guilty of a classic appeal to moderation. I remember the classic example of this: Tom wants to kill all puppies. Richard wants to kill no puppies. Jim suggests killing 50% of puppies as a compromise.

     Glad I don't know anyone like that in real life.

You just summed up the "Middle Ground Fallacy" rather perfectly. The very basis of Moderate Heroism.

Before the Civil War, a Moderate Hero in the US would be for keeping slavery, just not allowing it in more territories. It could brutally continue where it already was.

In Nazi Germany, a Moderate Hero would simply be in favor of forced explusion of all Jews, rather than Genocide of them.

In pre-colonial India, a Moderate Hero would be for just allowing sati under SOME circumstances, not all the time. And would be for keeping the caste system, not just enforcing it too brutally.

In apartheid South Africa, a Moderate Hero would be for keeping blacks as second-class citizens instead of the even more brutal treatment. Actually this has a basis in reality, the much deservedly demonized P.W. Botha took a Moderate Hero-esque policy toward apartheid, South Africa in the 80s was a bit laxer than South Africa in the 60s. I suppose that made it a great compromise

I find it funny me and Phil agree so strongly on this. Actually if anything that just proves how right it is.

I think most would disagree with that.

A non-Moderate Hero would be for killing all Jews, all Blacks, expanding slavery to everywhere, etc. How is that better? You're simply doing what you always do: starting from your own view you define everything else as evil.

Above all, for whatever reason, you're assuming that everyone has to be a one-sided idiot and that anyone who isn't is somehow posturing. That is a strange assumption.

Let's leave the puppy-example. Should Jim have all the money in the world or no money? Should the tax-level be 100% or 0%? Should everyone be surgeons or should no one be a surgeon? And are these issues real, relevant issues as opposed to puppy-killing? Is it, in fact, true that we probably do need to kill puppies in certain cases (say, if they have rabies) but probably not all?

It's fairly typical that the kind of people who have been losing all arguments here for the past 4 or 5 years finally decided to come up with a code-word for "smarter and more rational than me" and then use it as a smear.

[Meeker]

There's this one guy I know who's like a real life Evan Bayh. Whenever we talk politics he always tries to take the moderate position because he "doesn't want to be too partisan".

You must be logged in to read this quote.

And he ended up trying to convince me about the merits of intelligent design. Which would be okay if he didn't do this every time - during the bailout he said he supported it but wanted to cut some parts out just because he sympathized with the Republican view of keeping deficits under control. Guy needs to stop waffling and pick a side some time.

So yes moderate heroism sucks.

     That person is guilty of a classic appeal to moderation. I remember the classic example of this: Tom wants to kill all puppies. Richard wants to kill no puppies. Jim suggests killing 50% of puppies as a compromise.

     Glad I don't know anyone like that in real life.

You just summed up the "Middle Ground Fallacy" rather perfectly. The very basis of Moderate Heroism.

Before the Civil War, a Moderate Hero in the US would be for keeping slavery, just not allowing it in more territories. It could brutally continue where it already was.

In Nazi Germany, a Moderate Hero would simply be in favor of forced explusion of all Jews, rather than Genocide of them.

In pre-colonial India, a Moderate Hero would be for just allowing sati under SOME circumstances, not all the time. And would be for keeping the caste system, not just enforcing it too brutally.

In apartheid South Africa, a Moderate Hero would be for keeping blacks as second-class citizens instead of the even more brutal treatment. Actually this has a basis in reality, the much deservedly demonized P.W. Botha took a Moderate Hero-esque policy toward apartheid, South Africa in the 80s was a bit laxer than South Africa in the 60s. I suppose that made it a great compromise

I find it funny me and Phil agree so strongly on this. Actually if anything that just proves how right it is.

I think most would disagree with that.

A non-Moderate Hero would be for killing all Jews, all Blacks, expanding slavery to everywhere, etc. How is that better? You're simply doing what you always do: starting from your own view you define everything else as evil.

Above all, for whatever reason, you're assuming that everyone has to be a one-sided idiot and that anyone who isn't is somehow posturing. That is a strange assumption.

Let's leave the puppy-example. Should Jim have all the money in the world or no money? Should the tax-level be 100% or 0%? Should everyone be surgeons or should no one be a surgeon? And are these issues real, relevant issues as opposed to puppy-killing? Is it, in fact, true that we probably do need to kill puppies in certain cases (say, if they have rabies) but probably not all?

It's fairly typical that the kind of people who have been losing all arguments here for the past 4 or 5 years finally decided to come up with a code-word for "smarter and more rational than me" and then use it as a smear.

You honestly feel that Ben's posts are "smarter and more rational" than a lot of others here?

[Gustaf]

There's this one guy I know who's like a real life Evan Bayh. Whenever we talk politics he always tries to take the moderate position because he "doesn't want to be too partisan".

You must be logged in to read this quote.

And he ended up trying to convince me about the merits of intelligent design. Which would be okay if he didn't do this every time - during the bailout he said he supported it but wanted to cut some parts out just because he sympathized with the Republican view of keeping deficits under control. Guy needs to stop waffling and pick a side some time.

So yes moderate heroism sucks.

     That person is guilty of a classic appeal to moderation. I remember the classic example of this: Tom wants to kill all puppies. Richard wants to kill no puppies. Jim suggests killing 50% of puppies as a compromise.

     Glad I don't know anyone like that in real life.

You just summed up the "Middle Ground Fallacy" rather perfectly. The very basis of Moderate Heroism.

Before the Civil War, a Moderate Hero in the US would be for keeping slavery, just not allowing it in more territories. It could brutally continue where it already was.

In Nazi Germany, a Moderate Hero would simply be in favor of forced explusion of all Jews, rather than Genocide of them.

In pre-colonial India, a Moderate Hero would be for just allowing sati under SOME circumstances, not all the time. And would be for keeping the caste system, not just enforcing it too brutally.

In apartheid South Africa, a Moderate Hero would be for keeping blacks as second-class citizens instead of the even more brutal treatment. Actually this has a basis in reality, the much deservedly demonized P.W. Botha took a Moderate Hero-esque policy toward apartheid, South Africa in the 80s was a bit laxer than South Africa in the 60s. I suppose that made it a great compromise

I find it funny me and Phil agree so strongly on this. Actually if anything that just proves how right it is.

I think most would disagree with that.

A non-Moderate Hero would be for killing all Jews, all Blacks, expanding slavery to everywhere, etc. How is that better? You're simply doing what you always do: starting from your own view you define everything else as evil.

Above all, for whatever reason, you're assuming that everyone has to be a one-sided idiot and that anyone who isn't is somehow posturing. That is a strange assumption.

Let's leave the puppy-example. Should Jim have all the money in the world or no money? Should the tax-level be 100% or 0%? Should everyone be surgeons or should no one be a surgeon? And are these issues real, relevant issues as opposed to puppy-killing? Is it, in fact, true that we probably do need to kill puppies in certain cases (say, if they have rabies) but probably not all?

It's fairly typical that the kind of people who have been losing all arguments here for the past 4 or 5 years finally decided to come up with a code-word for "smarter and more rational than me" and then use it as a smear.

You honestly feel that Ben's posts are "smarter and more rational" than a lot of others here?

No, but this isn't about Ben, deep-down. It's about people like Jfern, BRTD and Porce being bitter over getting defeated by people like Gabu or Alcon time after time in discussions. That's what this is really about, and has been from the start. Ben is just a convenient excuse.

[Ebowed]

Porce being bitter over getting defeated by people like Gabu or Alcon time after time in discussions

Yeah, it happens all the time...?

I hardly ever get into arguments anymore.  Not much point.

Nor did I have anything to do with the creation of 'moderate hero.'  My other post in this thread was in jest.

[Gustaf]

Porce being bitter over getting defeated by people like Gabu or Alcon time after time in discussions

Yeah, it happens all the time...?

I hardly ever get into arguments anymore.  Not much point.

Nor did I have anything to do with the creation of 'moderate hero.'  My other post in this thread was in jest.

I just picked people based on their comments here in the thread, I don't keep up with every detail anymore. So if you're not one of those people I retract and apologize.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

There's this one guy I know who's like a real life Evan Bayh. Whenever we talk politics he always tries to take the moderate position because he "doesn't want to be too partisan".

You must be logged in to read this quote.

And he ended up trying to convince me about the merits of intelligent design. Which would be okay if he didn't do this every time - during the bailout he said he supported it but wanted to cut some parts out just because he sympathized with the Republican view of keeping deficits under control. Guy needs to stop waffling and pick a side some time.

So yes moderate heroism sucks.

     That person is guilty of a classic appeal to moderation. I remember the classic example of this: Tom wants to kill all puppies. Richard wants to kill no puppies. Jim suggests killing 50% of puppies as a compromise.

     Glad I don't know anyone like that in real life.

You just summed up the "Middle Ground Fallacy" rather perfectly. The very basis of Moderate Heroism.

Before the Civil War, a Moderate Hero in the US would be for keeping slavery, just not allowing it in more territories. It could brutally continue where it already was.

In Nazi Germany, a Moderate Hero would simply be in favor of forced explusion of all Jews, rather than Genocide of them.

In pre-colonial India, a Moderate Hero would be for just allowing sati under SOME circumstances, not all the time. And would be for keeping the caste system, not just enforcing it too brutally.

In apartheid South Africa, a Moderate Hero would be for keeping blacks as second-class citizens instead of the even more brutal treatment. Actually this has a basis in reality, the much deservedly demonized P.W. Botha took a Moderate Hero-esque policy toward apartheid, South Africa in the 80s was a bit laxer than South Africa in the 60s. I suppose that made it a great compromise

I find it funny me and Phil agree so strongly on this. Actually if anything that just proves how right it is.

I think most would disagree with that.

A non-Moderate Hero would be for killing all Jews, all Blacks, expanding slavery to everywhere, etc. How is that better?

Uh, you are great misrepresenting my argument. Saying that Moderate Heroism is always wrong is not the same as saying a non-Moderate Hero is always right.

You're simply doing what you always do: starting from your own view you define everything else as evil.

So which of the positions outlined above do you not consider evil?

Above all, for whatever reason, you're assuming that everyone has to be a one-sided idiot and that anyone who isn't is somehow posturing. That is a strange assumption.

You really believe benconstine is sincere in all his views?

OK example: Ben supports civil unions but not gay marriage. I have yet to see him give a justification for this at all. While this is hardly as insidious a position as the above ones, it does show his lack of sincerity in views and desire to appear centrists. Sure it's not uncommon in politicians either, but their reason is obvious. Does anyone honestly believe John Kerry and Barack Obama sincerely oppose gay marriage? I doubt ben does either, but a kid on an internet message board has less of an excuse for triangulating than a Presidential candidate.

Let's leave the puppy-example. Should Jim have all the money in the world or no money? Should the tax-level be 100% or 0%? Should everyone be surgeons or should no one be a surgeon? And are these issues real, relevant issues as opposed to puppy-killing? Is it, in fact, true that we probably do need to kill puppies in certain cases (say, if they have rabies) but probably not all?

Non-political issues. PiT was simply demonistrating the Middle Ground Fallacy, the very basis of Moderate Heroism. I gave actual political examples above.

It's fairly typical that the kind of people who have been losing all arguments here for the past 4 or 5 years finally decided to come up with a code-word for "smarter and more rational than me" and then use it as a smear.

Uh, the phrase "Moderate Hero" was initially coined by Tweed to describe Ben. So in other words it has nothing to do with the people you're talking about in the later post.

Also Alcon has basically outrighted admitted that yes, there was a correlation between which candidate he supported for President and whichever candidate was doing better in the polls and that his "support" of McCain at one point wasn't really sincere and more an excuse to be non-partisan to himself. Is that rational? I doubt even he would defend it now.

[Kaine for Senate '18]

I think of "marriage" as a purely religious institution.  Therefore, if a Church/Synagogue/Mosque do not want to grant a gay couple a marriage, then the State has no right to make them.  The State can, and should, however, give the gay couple all the benefits they would receive if they were in a heterosexual, religiously sponsored "marriage."

[Eraserhead]

I think of "marriage" as a purely religious institution.  Therefore, if a Church/Synagogue/Mosque do not want to grant a gay couple a marriage, then the State has no right to make them.  The State can, and should, however, give the gay couple all the benefits they would receive if they were in a heterosexual, religiously sponsored "marriage."

And you'd be wrong.

[Mint]

I think of "marriage" as a purely religious institution.

Except it's not.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

That's good because churches aren't legally mandated to do anything right now. Why is this brought up in this debate so much? No one on the Pro Gay Marriage side is seriously proposing anything like this.

You must be logged in to read this quote.

Religious Marriage doesn't afford any rights by itself. Civil Marriage, which is another thing entirely, does. Otherwise no one would care about this issue. And no, Civil Unions aren't the same thing by a different name because the federal benefits are different. And even if they weren't why the hell should we have to settle for 'separate but equal'? Because it makes people uncomfortable? Weak.

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

I think of "marriage" as a purely religious institution.

Well curent it is not.

Therefore, if a Church/Synagogue/Mosque do not want to grant a gay couple a marriage, then the State has no right to make them.

And currently that does not happen in any state with gay marriage. No state is forcing religious institutions to do so, it's simply recognizing it in the secular sense.

The State can, and should, however, give the gay couple all the benefits they would receive if they were in a heterosexual, religiously sponsored "marriage."

...which is exactly what having gay marriage recognized by the government does.

[Mint]

When BRTD and I agree on anything..

[Gustaf]

Ok, I'm going to post the first sentence involving moderate hero:

you want to be a USElectionAtlas Moderate Hero just like Gabu, Joe Republic, and some other blowhards. 

This was never about Ben, imo. He was just an easier way to get to those other people who were hard to attack directly. It's classic guilt by association.

And I was not misrepresenting your argument, Zach. I was simply pointing out why it wasn't much of an argument. You were giving examples of why moderate positions were dubious on some issues, and I showed non-moderate positions could be worse. The problem is you are assuming your own position and then disliking other positions. That isn't really a case against moderation as a principle.

I showed that your Middle Ground Fallacy was pretty dumb. In the vast, vast majority of all cases the extremes are much more stupid than the Middle Ground.

If you want to consider Abraham Lincoln evil, sure. If you are going to judge historical figures by their views on issues like homosexuality, racial tolerance, gender equality and democracy you can make every person before 1900 evil. I think that indicates precisely what is wrong with your approach and right with moderation.

And I'm not gonna respond to your Ben-examples. I don't think he's the real issue.