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Home Front: Politix
Tribalism, Confirmation Bias, and COVID
2020-08-08
A very long winded (Ilana Mercer-lite) view of 'group think' which points to World War as a potential solution. Even a bit too dark for me, but there it is.
[Red State] During the Civil War somewhere around 750,000 men fought for the Confederacy. It would be idiotic to claim that the Civil War was not about slavery, however the vast majority of the men who fought for the Confederacy were not fighting for the right to own slaves. How do I know this? During the 1860 census there were only about 385,000 slave owners. Many of these slave owners lived in states like West Virginia (well, not in 1860, but just follow for a minute), Deleware, Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri. If every slave owner in the south fought for the Confederacy (any who owned more than 20 slaves were exempt) then it would still have made up less than half the Confederate army. So how was it possible that so many fought for states rights when the primary right in question was the right to own other people? Simple... tribalism. The other side was awful in every way. Everything was linked, and you don’t get to tell me how to live my life. The Yank was an oppressor on our soil trying to force us to [fill in something here] and he should go home.

Tribalism is the simplification for "me and my group against you and your group." You end up thinking the other side is always wrong about everything, and if they change their mind then you change yours too. Example? Heritage Foundation laid out a market based plan for getting everyone into a health insurance policy. Their plan was based on the Swiss plan that works generally pretty well. Mitt Romney adopted the plan in Massachusetts with the general backing of Republicans. Barack Obama uses the same plan as a basis for a national plan, and now the whole project is the Devil and only flaming liberals would ever approve. Maybe that struck a nerve. Let’s go with a different example... Nancy Pelosi and Joe Biden vote to fund a physical barrier along the southern border to prevent illegal immigration. Barack Obama deports more illegal immigrants than any previous American president. Donald Trump begins to build the wall that Joe Biden voted for, and now any barrier is racist.
Posted by:Besoeker

#16  @#13 - Look at the image at the top to the right of "Rantburg".
Posted by: Clem   2020-08-08 19:45  

#15  @ #11 - Like we have "true" capitalism now? It's not even close to "free market" or "laissez-faire" capitalism. There are barriers to entry all over the place and nothing to do with slavery. They are called patents and fees and licenses and rules/regulations.

Posted by: Clem   2020-08-08 19:44  

#14  Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure
- Lincoln

Like I wrote, talking around the subject
Posted by: Procopius2k   2020-08-08 18:04  

#13  'Burg divided 'gainst isself ... cain't stand (it no mo)
Posted by: Caesar Protector of the Huns5458   2020-08-08 16:43  

#12  Like all politicians Lincoln talked around the subject. You can not escape the 13th Amendment. As for why the North fought you can find in their culture - Battle Hymn of the Republic and Battle Cry of Freedom. Those were sung in the rank. No hiding about ending slavery there.

I'm sure you'll give it up about the same time the race hustlers give up playing the slavery card.
Posted by: Procopius2k   2020-08-08 16:18  

#11  /\ What about Hereditary Slavery, in essence a perpetual Class System? How can you have a Capitalist System where a large fraction are barred from it?
Posted by: magpie   2020-08-08 13:57  

#10  /\ You used present tense in your question, not past tense. Of course slavery wasn't voluntary then. That is one of the few things they teach correctly in school.

There were slaves in the North as well.

But the answer is still YES to your question.
Posted by: Clem   2020-08-08 13:38  

#9  #8 (a) Slavery wasn't voluntary.
(b) It's not a question of ethics. Agrarian slave owners & industrialized capitalists have very different financial interests. As North developed, the dominance of the government by the Southerners became intolerable.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru   2020-08-08 13:11  

#8  /\ Thank you, DB. And that Morrill Tariff was a biggie that ticked off the South.

@ #7 - g(r)om, theoretically, YES. In a totally free society, what if I wanted to voluntarily & without coercion be a slave to a landowner (for example) to support my family? What if supporting my family was more important to me than my freedom?
Posted by: Clem   2020-08-08 12:45  

#7  #3 Klement, do you claim that a capitalist society and slave society can coexist in the same country?
Posted by: g(r)omgoru   2020-08-08 12:40  

#6  ^ Abraham Lincoln repeatedly stated his war was caused by taxes only, and not by slavery, at all.
"My policy sought only to collect the Revenue (a 40 percent federal sales tax on imports to Southern States under the Morrill Tariff Act of 1861)." reads paragraph 5 of Lincoln's First Message to the U.S. Congress, penned July 4, 1861.
"I have no purpose, directly or in-directly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so," Lincoln said it his first inaugural on March 4 of the same year.
There is no proof of Lincoln ever declaring the war was fought to abolish slavery, and without such an official statement, the war-over-slavery teaching remains a complete lie and offensive hate speech that divides Americans, as is being done now by the media and politicians regarding the Confederate flag in South Carolina.
Posted by: Deacon Blues   2020-08-08 12:04  

#5  Exactly, especially since Lincoln at one time was willing to accept a constitutional amendment guaranteeing slavery.
Posted by: Clem   2020-08-08 12:02  

#4  ..13th Amendment - Not passable in 1860, passed in 1865. No coincidence.
Posted by: Procopius2k   2020-08-08 11:44  

#3  "idiotic to claim that the Civil War was not about slavery..."

Absolute rubbish statement.
Posted by: Clem   2020-08-08 09:15  

#2  Nice load of garbage: "Barack Obama uses the same plan as a basis for a national plan, and now the whole project is the Devil and only flaming liberals would ever approve."

In fact the Democrat Authoritarians want to ELIMINATE your plans you may currently enjoy and prefer and force you into the one they deem best (for you)
Posted by: Frank G   2020-08-08 08:17  

#1  "me and my group against you and your group."

..and in any other year, seen in the fall as Texas plays Oklahoma, Georgia plays Alabama, Michigan plays Ohio State, etc. My Team!
Posted by: Procopius2k   2020-08-08 07:24  

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