Comments by "Ash Roskell" (@ashroskell) on "a few thoughts about some of the random comments on here" video.

  1. I too believe in taking each situation on its own merits (or demerits) and assessing them accordingly. One must be willing to admit mistakes and change one’s point of view. I have never doubted your integrity, sincerity or open mindedness in this regard. You touch on something that has occupied my mind a lot lately. When I hear people dismissing others with an overused epithet like, “woke,” they immediately lose something in my heart and mind. There’s a negative internal recoiling within me. And it is at that, “tribalism,” I think. It is so depressing that people use these terms instead of doing the heavy lifting intellectually, for the sake of convenience and so as to, “identify,” themselves with their tribe. As with all of these American imports, the, “culture wars,” are a deliberate attempt to dumb down discourse, tribalise all talking points and to remove responsible intelligent engagement with ideas or situations that make people uncomfortable. And because it’s easy, it’s appealing. I nearly always find that people who use, “woke,” as a pejorative cannot define the term at all, or will often describe it as something it is objectively not. What it actually is (as I can best describe it) can be articulated as a disparaging term of suspicion and categorisation of the, “other,” as someone who uses, “virtue signalling,” (another ridiculous term) and the appearance of seeking equality and diversity falsely, as a stick with which to beat down others in matters of art, politics and culture. It was invented (or rather, re-invented) by far right wing Americans of the Steve Bannon / Roger Stone ilk, seeking to deepen divisions in society and to raise their own boats on a tide of bile. Anything that provides the user with a catch-all term that excuses intellectual interrogation of the facts or issues in hand is useful to the types of people who make a living from the, “outrage,” and unhappiness of others. One of the many things I most admire about you, sir, is that you do not subscribe (so far as I can tell) to any one prescription or mode of thought, be that philosophically, politically or intellectually. You seem, rather, to encourage interrogation of the facts, analysis and consideration. You are also capable of changing your views and accounting for them. That is part of your charm as far as I’m concerned. Perhaps the real problem is that a fully rational, open minded person, will never be able to please all the people all the time? Perhaps they should never seek to? Heck! My wife and I disagree about lots of political matters, so I would be hard pressed to conform to any one group’s best groupthink, even if I tried. But we respect one another and do not see our disagreements as a reason to lose any of that respect. Perhaps that is the test of character we should be most concerned about? When the pejoratives and ad hominems start flying, that is usually just someone’s attempt to brow beat another person (or persons) into conforming to their tribe’s groupthink. A form of emotional blackmail. And that is another reason why I find it hard to respect people who use terms in such a manner.
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