If you enter into debates with weak ad hominem arguments about someone's age, you aren't going to change minds and you will be steamrolled by anyone with an understanding of the topic.
Skimming your recent posts, I don't think our political views are particularly different, so it's in both of our interests if you are using the best arguments possible on these topics. This was not an attack on you as a person, so your hostile response is unnecessary.
It's a bad position to be in. If they crash it will be bad, but if they keep growing and then crash it could be worse.
According to Chenoweth, the number refers to peak, not cumulative participation. She also says 3.5% is not absolute – even non-violent campaigns can succeed with less participation, according to her 2020 update to the rule.
That's the opposite of what her update said (well, it's rather misleading). Her update noted cases where nonviolence failed even when they beat 3.5% - including one case that achieved 6% participation. She did note that most successful attempts didn't need to reach 3.5%, but also that reaching that is no longer a guarantee.
Her original research only went to 2006, there's been a few recent cases which broke the rule. Like she said in her update, history isn't necessarily a predictor of future results. I think there are also some very recent cases like Nepal where 95% of the movement is nonviolent, but violence at the very end of the movement tips the scale. (IIRC something similar happened with the Iranian revolution, though the results of that were decidedly undemocratic in the long run). There's some nuance with Nepal as well- the organizers did not choose to go for violence, it was largely an unplanned mob reaction.
Based on the totality of her research (which is publicly accessible and based on publicly accessible data), I still think nonviolence is more likely to achieve success than violence, but it really annoys me when articles like this one overstate the effects. It makes it really easy to tear apart the argument.
Worse, it's a few megabytes of selfhosted storage. Data on a server you own that you are not allowed to access.
The politics of preservation is definitely an interesting one. I suppose one argument in favor of preserving more popular music is that there are going to be fewer popular tracks than unpopular tracks - and they're already at 300TB, which is nothing to sneeze at, especially since it's a third the size of their existing library of ebooks.
You're not wrong (in my city, the "mayor" is basically another city council member with no extra powers, just the same voting power as the other council members), but I don't quite get what you're disagreeing with me on.
Do you think that all a mayor does is send press releases and give the key to the city to the Powerpuff girls? In NYC especially, local government controls a lot
At this point, the difference is mostly in stability. It's highly unlikely that Harris would have slapped a bunch of tarrifs around willy nilly, and she probably wouldn't be blowing up a bunch of ships near Venezuela (I wouldn't rule it out, but I would assume that the false flag operation would be more subtle).
US voting is 100% picking the lesser evil, at least for now. The current hope would be that democratic socialists gain enough standing to take over the democratic party, so that voters have meaningful choice. In an ideal world, we'd repeal things like citizens united as well
This post in particular probably won't cause a wide swing in support, but it will cause a few people to reconsider past beliefs. This might get those people thinking if it was really OK to make fun of the attack on Pelosis husband, and then that might get them to reconsider how they look at Jan 6.
Rising grocery bills will flip more people than this, of course
I'm not saying that the people who change their minds now are good people (I don't think anyone thinks this) but we need everyone we can get (WITHOUT compromising our core values) when it comes to opposing trump. Every time he fucks up, we need to put the pressure on. Cult deprogramming is difficult, and can't be done for everyone, but it is possible.
There is only one person you are helping when you preach defeatism and give up early.
I think this is a more nuanced take on the situation. I would agree that folks who are directly impacted by an issue are more likely to be impacted by it. Original comment seemed too absolutist too me.
I think there are 22yo who can be impacted by the issue of taxes while being poor (Though they may end up on the other side of the argument). For example, issues of food stamps and medicare-for-all affect all ages. A 22yo might have a strong opinion in favor of taxation for these purposes. A conservative making an ad hominem argument on the basis of age in this case (e.g., that they are simply being manipulated by the radical left) would be clearly incorrect.
I also think, as more of a moral argument, you shouldn't need to be directly impacted by something in order to support/oppose it. I am not on food stamps but I absolutely think we should have them (or perhaps "upgrade" it to UBI to avoid nonsense on what poor people are allowed to buy).
In any case, dismissing someone as simply being manipulated is not a good approach in general. It could be a good approach when we are specifically talking about the person overselling on confirmation bias from ChatGPT, but it is a poor way to change minds as a general tactic.
Is there any particular language I should adjust to avoid being "aggro"? I did say that I hated their argument. And I did call them hostile after their last sarcastic response to me trying to extend an olive branch.
Is that going too far? "Touch grass" is about the same level, I would think, but I've been wrong before and I'll be wrong again.