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Vinther1991 on 10 July 2025
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Mnementh said:
SeaDaVie said:

That’s because most things that leftwing people believe in are actual facts and basic truths, and there can’t be much deviation on that. Like if you believe in climate change then believe in climate change. If you believe in equality then you believe in equality for all, no exceptions but the biases and intolerances of the right are many and varied(some dislike foreigners but are ok with gays, some despise both, some just hate Jews, some are even relatively tolerant and just believe in traditional conservative values in relation to things like government size and tax). The right encompasses the traditional fiscal conservatives, the religious extreme, the religious moderates, the conspiracy theorists, poor rural people that believe electing billionaires will be good for them etc.

Nah, this is a general error of thinking facts and science are determining politics. They never did and never do. Science describes the world as it is, politics is about shaping the world the way you want it to be. In the past often the right used this fallacy, talking about the *natural* way or whatever.

But we have to understand that different politics doesn't spring (mostly) from differences in understanding the world, but from differences in the goal on how the world should be. Facts can only help us decide if certain policies are *useful* and *effective* to reach that goal. Which currently the left is getting worse at. One example: there currently is a strong believe in the left that language and speech has major influence. Science is very reluctant here and doesn't really support this, at least not in the degree that many on the left claim it is. So, following the science would mean that all efforts to shape language in an attempt to shape society would be deemed ineffective policy and we should move to different policies. But I don't see the current left finding that conclusion (the left I remember from the 90s scoffed at the idea and wanted material change instead).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CmZdGo6b5yA

So no, the left and the right are using science and facts the same way: emphasizing which fits their worldwiev, twisting or ignoring what doesn't.

You bring up an example that doesn’t help your point. “That language and speech have major influence” is by your own admission not factually incorrect, we just don’t know for sure to what extent it does. It also isn’t a left wing idea, but one pushed equally by the right when they find it convenient.

Either way, that is not equivalent to making factually incorrect statements like climate change isn’t real or isn’t mainly caused by human activity, or Donald Trump won the 2020 election, or vaccines don’t work, or the January 6th rioters were ANTIFA. That’s detached from empirical reality.