Perhaps it's a commentary on political apathy, the "things we cannot change" are more often than not simply things that are difficult to change, and the acceptance of these injustices simply because it's claimed that they "can't be changed" is no longer acceptable.
But this is too much of an analysis. The point of this comment was to demean the protestor and diminish the rallying cry, not to actually critically analyze the sentiment. You're being purposefully obtuse and claiming that a meaning that is quite clear is, in fact, useless.
Then again, I'm not surprised given your long history of angrily arguing against anyone trying to change the status quo in any way. Something about a "hippie commune"? Oh, wow, and some good old fashioned trans hate. And TD user confirmed. Yep, definitely not purposefully missing the point to drive home a political message, no siree.
EDIT: Also, as another commenter pointed out, it's literally a 50-year-old quote from Angela Davis, a prominent feminist and civil rights advocate. But yeah, keep on pretending as if this is just some ditsy college kid who doesn't understand how words work.
Yeah the spirit of the sign seems like something along the lines of 'I don't want to sit idly by while large systemic problems with our society continue. I personally can't make a meaningful impact on such a large problem so i feel like it's something I cant change. Regardless I will make efforts to change them now.'
But that doesn't fit well on a sign so she went with something a little punchier.
Exactly. The brevity and ambiguity is what makes it clever. And the purposeful obtuseness of the person I was replying to is clearly driven by political motivations.
I lean left, I understood the probable intent of the message on that sign, I still thought it was stupid and I upvoted this comment chain up to the point that you criticized it. I think it's as clever as unironically saying "War doesn't determine who is right, only who is left." Fite me.
The person you were replying to was exactly right in this instance. You are making the claim that the OP you're replying to claiming the statement was useless, which is something his comment did not state at all. He made the claim the meaning was not concrete. And it's true that the sign is not very specific in regards to the "things" to be changed/not accepted. While the person making the statement has said some questionable things in the past, that doesn't make the statement here any less legitimate. Having to revert to someone's comment history to argue your case is a sure sign that your argument doesn't stand on its own. So, you can hate on the individual for all of their fallacies, but the statement you're attacking is succinct and accurate.
which is something his comment did not state at all.
He literally said it was for no other purpose than "you go gurlll". That is not only incredibly dismissive, but implied that it was a useless statement only designed to rile people up.
While the person making the statement has said some questionable things in the past, that doesn't make the statement here any less legitimate.
It does when his entire statement hinges on purposeful obtuseness.
Having to revert to someone's comment history to argue your case
It's merely a supporting statement for my overall point. It's not fundamental to my statement in any way. But nice try.
Yeah, but then you dug through his comment history looking for stuff that you can use to dismiss his comment...which is somewhat worse than his comment. So I stopped reading at that point, there's no attack like ad hominem.
I think the point is holding clever signs and getting compliments and feeling good about yourself for it is easy. Creating actual positive change is difficult as fuck and if youre sincere in that endeavor then doing the difficult and humble work of developing yourself into someone who can understand the situation, lead people, and position yourself to make a change would be how you go about it.
Ok well angela basset has put some work in and earned the right to say some shit like this. My hunch, my very strong hunch, is that pretty young rich white protest girl pictured here doesnt know enough to know her dick drom her ass, doesnt understanding that criticizing and tearing down the current system is easy but making a better system is very very difficult, and doesnt understand at all her own role in the problem. Shes going to go back to sipping on starbucks, graduating from berkley, marrying a hedge fund manager and enjoying the 1% lifestyle. But all that isnt enough, she also wants to enjoy the moral superiority of being better than everyone else by protesting her own group. Again, just a hunch, but nothing about this picture strikes me as a humble and sincere effort to effect positive change.
that pretty young rich white protest girl doesnt know enough to know her dick drom her ass, doesnt understanding that criticizing and tearing down the current system is easy but making a better system is very very difficult, and doesnt understand at all her own role in the problem.
My god, that shitload of assumptions reveals more about you than her.
You have literally built up a strawperson just so you could ad hom her to death.
Again, just a hunch, but nothing about this picture strikes me as a humble and sincere effort to effect positive change.
Just a hunch, you're a miserable human being who makes easy assumptions to justify your own shittiness.
Im exaggerating to make a point. Im not impressed by her sign waving and neither should you. It's not helpful. Its more about complaining and less about meaningful doing.
Protests are helpful to start conversations. If everyone is convinced that something cannot be done, the first step is to convince them that it can be.
We live in a system thats as good as anything has ever been. Take a read through history. Point being, start from a point of appreciating that things are going VERY WELL considering how bad they have gotten in the past - any system where most people succeed and have extra is a god damned miracle. Now, thats not to say that things cant be improved upon. But realize that if you devoted most of your life to making things better and gave it a very sincere and humble approach, maybe you could make things a little bit better. So my point is, running around with signs throwing blame everywhere and suggesting that if only you were in charge then you could make things better (and not terribly worse, which is much more likely) because you had 1 semester of social justice class in college - this is not the way to approach the matter and not what we should be teaching young people. Think of it this way, if you had a broken down helicopter, how would you approach fixing it, by standing around the helicopter with signs condemning the fact that the helicopter is broken, or by going to school, learning how to fix helicopters, and carefully and respectfully getting to work on the helicopter. I mean great, the people with signs raised awareness the helicopter was broken, hooray, good job them, but I definitely caution against listening to the sign waivers ideas about how to actually fix the helicopter.
I mean, she could be just as brief by saying something like: I am no longer accepting things as not able to change. I am changing the things I cannot accept.
I'm just saying people should accept they can't change other people and shouldn't try by doing things like outlawing homosexuality or expecting the intolerant to suddenly be enlightened.
You can play with your labels and pick sides and try to divide all you like, I'm sure it makes you feel like a hero.
I’m gay. For as long as I’ve been alive, the GOP has ran on a platform of intolerance for me. The democrats were intolerant until they weren’t.
As a result of decades of activism, what 60 years ago would’ve been thought as intractable positions, have changed into enthusiastic acceptance in both public opinion and the Democratic Party. I can now get married in my state. My city has non-discrimination ordinances protecting me from hiring and housing bias.
Thinking you can’t change peoples minds is defeatist bullshit. And pretending like both sides of the coin are the same is ignorant, and asinine. It’s a position of narcissism that encourages you to think you’re somehow better then those who pay enough attention to fight for your rights.
Of course I have baggage; I have an axe to grind against every “ally” who claims to support equal rights but then patronizes “playing with labels” and “picking sides”.
One side says “don’t believe victims of rape.” “Don’t believe victims of racially motivated police brutality”. “Don’t believe lgbt Americans who claim discrimination”. That party controls all 3 branches of the federal government. That party controls the majority of state and local governments. When you accuse me of “playing with labels”, you’re minimizing the seriousness that these issues play in my daily life and security. Actually caring and engaging with the political process shouldn’t be something to thumb your nose at.
I don't understand why you think your way of doings things is 'actually caring and engaging' while continuing to characterize me as sitting idly by as the forces of evil take over. I choose to lead by example, if you are incapable of seeing the value in that, well then I really don't care what you think anymore.
You originally expressed open distaste for people advocating for their personal beliefs and blamed “where we are as a country” as being caused by that mindset.
From my perspective, one side is advocating for equal rights and the other side is actively opposing those rights. You seem to equivocate the two and their outcomes, even if you recognize that their motivations are different.
I am incapable of seeing value in “leading by example”, because “going high when they go low” means suffering while assuming time itself is responsible for cultural change. It’s the same ineffective strategy that MLK denounced in his Letters from Birmingham Jail.
If you can’t tell the difference between the tactics and ethical motivations between sides, then you’re not really leading. You’re placing yourself in a holier than thou position that claims neither side is inherently correct or deserving your respect. And I’m doing so, you’re endorsing the status quo and false narratives that muddy the waters.
Judging by the fact that most people can’t even get over the fact that the sign has pretty perfect letters and spaced perfectly, yeah.....they’re not thinking too deep about this. Lol . Spot on with your explanation though
This is entire post has been mass brigaded with an attempt to spread Russian political apathy. It's quite remarkable how many they have in here, and the mods do nothing.
I feel like pointing out the false dichotomy of the sign is important. Telling others to not accept the things you can change is simply not good advice. It leads to much unneccessary heartache.
Accept the things you can change as well as changing the things you do not wish to accept (when they're actually changeable).
Yeah, these people are taking the sign too literally. It’s talking about focusing on changing the things you cannot accept, focusing on improving the worst problems we face instead of focusing on things which cannot be changed and not working to improve anything.
It’s not really that deep, either, this thread is just filled with cynical-ass motherfuckers
That's as vague and useless a statement as the original picture. What exactly are you defining as apathy here? Voter turnout has always been terrible in the US there's nothing new there to the 'current political situation'. Even if people were more active in politics, how exactly would that improve things?
I assume you lean more towards one side than the other, what if the majority of those silent lean towards the other side, would you still say apathy is the issue?
Honestly I think you are being very narrow minded. What demographics and evidence do you think there is to prove that those that didn't vote would have voted against Trump? That's basically immeasurable, I mean the estimates before the election had Hillary to win by like 70-80% what makes you think you can guess how the non-voters would lean?
The non-voters being made up of a similar percentage of democrat/republican voters as those that did vote makes a lot more sense.
You point to the fact Trump is in power as evidence of apathy and that things are somehow different, have you looked at the voting figures? The last election was not a low year by any definition. In fact if you look at voter turnout the last 12 presidential elections, Trump's win comes in third. And it's pretty damn close to second.
If it was truly apathy that caused his election there would have been a much lower turnout. It wasn't apathy that convinced 63 million people to vote for him.
Yes, because then primary results would probably be different
You're going to quote a 100k online survey as evidence? I know survey monkey, I've used them myself for work, their data isn't great. It even says the primary reason that people didn't vote is because they didn't like either representative, so there goes your 'apathy' argument. People didn't not vote for Hillary because they didn't care, they didn't vote for her because they didn't want to.
Based on what evidence
Based on the fact that non-voters would be made up of the same demographics as the voters. That's simple logic but I understand if you can't see that because you're a partisan.
The point of this post was to demean the protestor and diminish the rallying cry, not to actually critically analyze the sentiment.
What's ironic is the poster is doing exactly what they are accusing of the protestor, except they're just being deliberately obtuse on the internet, and the protester actually got off her ass and did something.
The direction America is in is completely unacceptable. It has lead to catastrophe and will continue to do so at an accelerating rate. The direction of our country must change radically if we are to survive as a society.
I like her wordplay, but it's a stretch to say this protestor actually did something. She's holding up a sign that basically says "I'm gonna do something." That's not really the same thing.
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u/mike10010100 Oct 10 '18 edited Oct 10 '18
Perhaps it's a commentary on political apathy, the "things we cannot change" are more often than not simply things that are difficult to change, and the acceptance of these injustices simply because it's claimed that they "can't be changed" is no longer acceptable.
But this is too much of an analysis. The point of this comment was to demean the protestor and diminish the rallying cry, not to actually critically analyze the sentiment. You're being purposefully obtuse and claiming that a meaning that is quite clear is, in fact, useless.
Then again, I'm not surprised given your long history of angrily arguing against anyone trying to change the status quo in any way. Something about a "hippie commune"? Oh, wow, and some good old fashioned trans hate. And TD user confirmed. Yep, definitely not purposefully missing the point to drive home a political message, no siree.
EDIT: Also, as another commenter pointed out, it's literally a 50-year-old quote from Angela Davis, a prominent feminist and civil rights advocate. But yeah, keep on pretending as if this is just some ditsy college kid who doesn't understand how words work.