idiggory wrote:
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First off, they're not all blog sites, are they? The first link is an online newsletter for MIT. Or did you not bother to check?
Apparently you didn't. Check again. It's an OPINION piece published in the OPINION section by someone who specializes in economics, not social history.
But not on a conservative blog site. Try to stay focused on the issue.
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Oh I'm sure. You and the rest of the conservative fringe just happened to make the same argument without ever once managing to produce a single primary source to suggest you're correct? Yeah, I believe that. I really do.
The phrase "conservative fringe" is circular the way you're using it, isn't it?
Me, and a lot of other people, arrive
at the same conclusions without needing to consult with each other or parrot a source. Why? Because those conclusions are the result of rational examination of facts. WTF? You honestly can't comprehend this?
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You seem to misunderstand what we are demanding when we ask for proof. We aren't asking if you are alone in thinking the way you do, we are asking for any reason to suggest that you could be correct. NONE of those links do that. At all.
I provided pages of explanation as to why I'm right. I provided the step by step logic for any thinking person to figure it out. I invited anyone to provide an alternative explanation. No one did. And then, finally, at last resort, I provided several links to others who had come to the same conclusion I had. Absent a counter explanation, why assume they all must be wrong? And that I must be wrong?
Um... And you're still making a circular argument here. You just admitted that the links were demanded because the other posters would not accept my explanation and reasoning as sufficient, and required that I link to other people saying the same thing. But now, because I linked to other people saying the same thing, I must be wrong because I linked to other people saying the same thing. Isn't that bizarre thinking on your part?
I didn't read those sites and then decide I agreed with them. I already held my own position, and linked to those sites only to show that others believed the same. I'm not sure what warped logic you're using here. This is not remotely the same as someone linking to a blog site with half-facts and innuendo, accepting their unproven claims as absolute fact, providing not logical rational for why they're true, and still repeating them as though they were.
Which was what happened in this thread earlier. The OP linked to an incredibly biased source with gaps in their claims a mile wide, yet another poster didn't just accept the ridiculous claims, but went a step further and insisted that there must be some sort of fraud going on. Even the biased source didn't claim that, but an impressionable poster did. Think about that.
I don't do that. I form my own opinions. I always have.
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Again, you're obfuscating things. The fact that your opinion isn't held only by you isn't logically persuasive at all. It could be the majority opinion and STILL be wrong.
And you'll repeat this every time Joph demand a cite when all I'm doing is presenting a logical argument, right? I didn't link those sites because I think it makes my argument stronger, but because other people on this forum tend to reject any argument out of hand unless one can provide a cite. Even when it's not the facts in dispute, but some logical extrapolation of the facts (like: Why does the government provide those benefits to married couples in the first place?).
I understand what you're saying. Many on this forum don't.
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And never once did you provide any proof to suggest that your account didn't rely on revisionist history, which primary sources would have done.
Except in this case
there is no "primary source". That was the point I even made in that thread. There is no all-knowing authoritative completely accepted by all parties source which can answer the question I was asking ("why does government provide those benefits?"). It doesn't exist! My point for providing those links was to show that when one searches for "state interest in marriage", those are the results you'll find.
I repeatedly invited anyone in that thread to provide alternative explanations. No one did. In the absence of an alternative, what the hell are we supposed to do? In that case, I was arguing with people who refused to accept the logical reasoning I provided, even though the refused to provide any alternative explanations, and then dismissed the links showing others arriving at the same conclusions as I, again even though they could provide no alternative sources themselves.
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This is basic stuff here.
Yes. It is basic stuff. If I provide some logic, evidence, and support for my position, no matter how much you may view it as "biased", it's still stronger than the position for which no one provides any logic, reason, nor support at all. You get that right? My whole reason for providing those links was simply to show that if you randomly googled the question being asked, these were the results you'd get. I then followed that with an invitation for anyone to find some competing explanation.
No one did. So how is that remotely similar to what the OP (and other posters in this thread) did? It's not, and you darn well know it!
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And when a conservative happens to regurgitate the same crap that the conservative fringe is, you have to wonder as well.
That maybe they know what the hell they're talking about? This goes back to the whole "circular labeling" bit. If you label anyone who says X as part of the "conservative fringe" and the reject anything said by the "conservative fringe", you're really just giving yourself an excuse to not think about the issue itself.
What's funny is that you are doing exactly what you're claiming I do. You're judging someone's opinion based on who they are, rather than what they're actually saying. So anyone who doesn't agree with spending for stimulus is part of the "conservative fringe" and can be ignored. And anyone who opposes raising taxes to pay for all that stimulus spending which wasn't supposed to require raising taxes is also part of the "conservative fringe" and can be ignored. But aren't just just associating positions with labels?
Where did you learn those associations? I can tell you exactly how and why I opposed the stimulus spending, raising taxes, and a host of other positions I hold, without once mentioning or labeling any of the groups of people involved. I can do this just by objectively assessing the proposed actions and their likely results. But you can't, can you? For you it's: "conservatives want to keep taxes the same on the rich; conservatives are bad/stupid/whatever; therefore I oppose keeping taxes the same on the rich". That's really the limit of your political thought.
And again, the irony there is astounding. You're projecting.