Comments by "Brenda Rua" (@brendarua01) on "A young poet tells the story of Darfur | Emtithal Mahmoud" video.

  1. She has the heart and wisdom of a poet laureate. I am in awe. Thank you for sharing this.
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  2. +Chidds Sadly your simple explanation is too simplistic. Sure there are plenty who post something along the lines of TED doing something on science. But it is TED's channel to use as they wish. They say in their description, "The TED Talks channel features the best talks and performances from the TED Conference, where the world's leading thinkers and doers give the talk of their lives in 18 minutes (or less). Look for talks on Technology, Entertainment and Design -- plus science, business, global issues, the arts and more." Viewers who don't like it are just a free to leave, to unsubscribe. Or better yet, start their own channel. However, a very large percentage of criticism is triggered by gender and social issues. Add a darker skin color to the mix and it's like a river dance with all the knee jerking. It's a very clear pattern. There is plenty of overlap between the first and the second. But they are pretty clear and distinct. If you don't see it then that says something about you. Perhaps it's a chance to learn?
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  3. Dude, yes you do too.
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  4. +Chidds No, I made no assumptions about you. Please note I qualified my last suggestion about your perspective with an "if." I'm not even assuming your gender or race. I have suspicions, but they are not relevant and I hope to do you the courtesy of looking at your points on their merits. We obviously disagree on your blanket statements that all social justice issues have been debunked. As with most generalizations it is false on it's face. There is both anecdotal and statistical evidence to the contrary, that show differential distributions of social goods happened and still does. (Let me be clear that I am not saying any particular white man engaged in active discrimination against people of color or women. And I understand why individuals would be upset at being treated as a class.) But let's just agree to disagree since that's not the main point here. First, I submit to you that the fact TED deems it necessary to disable comments on certain kinds of presentations is prima facie evidence of unreasonable and uncivil responses. Are you prepared to argue they do it just to piss men off? Second, it seems reasonable to take the comments we do see as a reasonable sample of the population of viewers who do respond. I've no idea how well it represents the subscribers as a whole. But every presentation by a person of color or a non-male is guaranteed to have people expressing views they would not dare say face to face. It's only the anonymity provided by cyber that gives them courage like that from a bottle. I don't track the numbers, but I will call BS more often than not, here and other channels. A lot of comments made are questionable. (I'm not talking about the haters and trolls and cowards now.) These often seem to be reasonable people. But they make mistakes. They might make broad or absolute claims. They might make unreasonable assumptions or outright lie. They might make invalid or unsound conclusions. They might just need to be clarified or fleshed out. By pointing these out and asking for supporting facts, for evidence, we might be able to raise the bar and even learn something once in a while. I feel pretty confident that TED would support discussions like this. Third, I do see you focus on the like/dislike ratio. Frankly I'm not sure what to make of that. There isn't a lot to go on other than noting that some are "voting" before they could have seen more that a few minutes.
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  5. Which statement? Well it's true you didn't say the word "all." But let's look at your statement: "So called "social justice" needs to catch up with the times. SJWs are still using debunked arguments to push their ideological agenda. We live in the age of the Internet, yet these arguments are still presented as gospel to the neglect of their problems. " Wit no qualifier or scope given, the implication to me is "all." It is a pretty common rhetorical device. And when I mentioned liking/disliking early on, I did not "pick on" dislikes alone. To paraphrase, "Thou doth protest too much, methinks."
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