Yes. That's pretty much what the article says. Be upset at the perceived insult all you want, but you're simply confirming a theory put forth there. It's NOT an insulting theory. It's NOT a reason for you to be upset. Frankly - it probably shouldn't be a reason for ME to be upset...

I... I just can't.
This statement alone has shown that we come from very, very different worlds. Everything about your writing is extremely foreign to me: the short bursts of words interspersed with innumerable line breaks, the lack of punctuation, no capital letters to speak of, the train-of-thought nature of your reasoning...
I bear no ill will. Have a nice morning and the rest of the day.

:) how's that quote from Se7en? The world is not nice, but still worth fighting over...

Being that my temperament is a (to me) interesting mix of fiery and cold, I was compelled to post this. On one side the writer is clearly gifted; his exposition style seems to me particularly thorough, his willingness to go into minutiae admirable, and his profuseness means he often has his fingers on the beat of contemporary matters. On the other, my expectation that reactions to the post would mostly prove its point, was not disappointed, and I do so enjoy good rhetoric and a bit of hidden drama. ;)


Now Vestin, to your actual point, I don't know. It's possible this is just a surface appearance, and we're just going through another up n down like several in the past. I just can't shake a feeling we're heading into uncharted waters, more so than usual with the future, because we seem to be devaluing more and more our actual humanity. I see it all around; the atomization of interactions, the objectification of the other, technological autism, the singularity, simultaneous rejection of our bodies and closing of our minds... my hope is non western cultures may catalyze some new global synthesis, but looking at Japan the Western zeitgeist seems to be so strong.

As someone of a mostly political passivist persuasion, I get this urge to shout a warning, and I neither know against what exactly, nor feel comfortable with myself that I even care. Anyway thanks for your thoughts.
As my title tries to point out, the essay is precisely about how boring some really good thing are, and how sensationalism (not the author's word choice) mostly leads to counter productive radicalism. That's why Vestin found your posts an interesting example, through no fault of your own. Just a coincidence.

Never heard of him, nor the lady writer, I'll Google them, though the only clear thing from your link, is there is a feminism angle you see as important. Me I think humans are still humans, nothing new under the sun. I think technological changes are more relevant to our societal dynamics than most ideologies, though ideas do have power.

Like the invention of stirrups having more to do with the spread of Islam than what's written in the Koran?

Don't give in to that. People have always felt that they were the ones living in "the end times". We're not that special.

I guess you could start with "ideology" (in the worst sense). Mindless zealots are dangerous. Mindless people aren't - they simply need sympathy and help. Zealots aren't - they simply need a good cause... Things get scary when you face someone whose ignorance is only rivaled by the adamance of his beliefs.

Here's a 10 years old British documentary on something relevant.

I've more or less stopped caring about these things after realizing you can't rationalize with everyone.

Arguing about something is worthwhile when:
a) you can affect the outcome of whatever the topic is 'we should have pizza tonight vs we should have burgers'
b) you have a chance of converting your adversary to your point of view
c) you can offer a different perspective on something

When it comes to this radicalism you talk about, point a is not part of the equation because these people have no way of affecting the outcome of whatever their argument is about; frame-rates, what makes a game fun etc.
In most cases the favored outcome depends entirely on personal taste.

For example, you can argue all you want on every forum and in every youtube comment section, it still won't make your wish come true. Because you are insignificant when it comes to actually deciding these matters.

Which leads me to point b, which also has nu function, because everyone you encounter in these "discussions" have already made up their own mind or lack the ability to see things from other perspectives. Its usually one or the other. So there is no real chance of converting anyone.

Sure, for the moment you might win an argument over what makes a game good or bad, but you have only succeed in re-affirming for yourself what you already think and feel. It seems it is this confirmation people are high on.

Which leaves point c. Being able to offer different perspectives is beneficial when you can influence the outcome of something or have a chance of converting someone, otherwise its a purely intellectual exercise where you have simply managed to think differently than someone else. Regardless, it leads to the problem of making others understand your reasoning, which in my experience is rather futile when these 'radicals' are involved.

The problem is that everyone is so uptight about perceptions now days, afraid to offend everyone or anyone for fear that might put us on the outs. That goes for the individual all the way up to governments. If they offend too much they can't control those they don't want to offend.

The age of PC must die, and I am not talking about the desktop, at least not the electronic kind.

I'm hammering away at that brick wall everyday, buddy. We can only bring back sensible offense one man, one insult at a time. Hate speech. All that is nothing more than speech that someone else hates. In a world of constant connection and social media, it amazes me that people still haven't learned the fine art of using an ignore or delete button.

The only difference between real life arguments and internet ones is one of scale. I listen to many arguments between my coworkers, and they're not any better than what what's on the internet, except that they're more self contained. There are also people who like to argue more, and in real life they might not have partners, but on the internet it's easy to find many.

This is my point of view also. Both the zealot and the eternally ambiguous subjectivist that denies the fruits of empirical observation are potentially disastrous for our society.

While I agree that perfect knowledge is impossible, I also think you can tend toward it more so I don't think all points of view are equal.

I think an opinion that is researched with an open mind is stronger than an opinion that is sustained by inordinate desires.

It's okay to strongly believe in something, as long as you are willing to listen to those with dissenting points of views, actually ponder on their arguments and potentially modify your opinion (either in favour of theirs or otherwise in another direction that takes their arguments into account) if they are on to something.

Communication and pooling our minds together to get closer to truth is a very important thing to reach a deeper level of enlightenment.

It amazes me how similar these archetypes are. Both are the result of an individual giving up in his search for truth. The subjectivist believes the quest is pointless, the zealot believes he has already reached the destination. The only alternative to them is to keep oneself in the taxing position of constant uncertainty, to keep questioning and doubting, and searching. As far as this metaphor can take us, it's not surprising that some choose to settle instead of being on a constant journey...
As for the entirety of your post - it's music to my ears ^^.

Vestin, could you please recognize and acknowledge your passive aggressive behavior?


Aren't the things I highlighted good? Are you sure you're not missing the message?

Maybe yes? I'm not sure how important stirrups were in the second half of the first millennia in Byzantium, India or Africa.
Can't watch right now. I guess it's tragic how violence ends up being the rational outcome...

Anyway, it's not so much I see "the" end of times, rather an end to times I like being in.

Here are my thoughts on this subject matter:

A lot of people regard their opiniosn and the resulting standpoints as an extension of their personality. Normally, an opinion is open to change, when confronted with new information or different perspectives regarding a certain topic. But people who define themselves through their opinions and expressed standpoints, feel not just challenged to defend their point of view, instead they feel threatened that they get criticised as a person. This results in an aggressive and radical defense of the points of view in question.

Interesting article. The writer is spot on: Conflict and controversy is very media-friendly and goes viral easily. This is old hat in journalism, where the headlines typically try to frame even the most polite dialog as an aggressive conflict.

Sadly, this makes extremist viewpoint easier to spread, since conflict is their very foundation. Progressive views, which are based on mutual understanding, needs be framed as a conflict to gain media attention. But this goes against their true foundation.

Anyways - one thing I didn't like about the article is its ending:

"YOU KNOW WHAT NOBODY HATES EACH OTHER ABOUT YET? VIDEO GAMES.”

True, it's a good oneliner. It's clever. But this is a special sort of clevernes, one founded solely on the writer being clueless of the subject he is being clever about. He himself hasn't bothering researching the politicial conflict in the gaming community. Because he knows nothing about the subject, he hasn't made any stand himself. Rather than admitting that he lacks knowledge in the area, and probably should research the stuff or shut up, he takes a holier-than-you approach: Look, they are hating each other cause of video games! So they're stupid! I'm so clever!

It's easy to do that - you just have to enter any debate that you know absolutely nothing about, and then write some standard advice - both sides sound so aggressive, people should learn to listen to each other, and remember to look both ways before crossing, etc.

What I hate about this approach is that it is so wishy-washy that it automatically assume that both sides of the conflict per definition must be equally right. Fact is that many debates has turned out to have one side that was right, and another that was dead wrong. The "negro problem" turned out to be bullshit and so did the "jewish problem". Oh, and the witch problem of the Inqusition? Bullshit too. And yes, the witch problem was also debated - the start of Der Hexenhammer was dedicated to refute the popular arguments against the existence of witches. And back then, I'm sure some clueless jerk entered the witches-debate with some holier-than-thou arguments like 'both sides has valid points' and 'you should listen to each other'.