Comment Re:Good for Sundar Pichai, good for America (Score 2) 260
I live in an urban area and they are all urban kids (I grew up with farm kids). Not a single one of them can see the American flag without making a derogatory comment. They automatically look down on folks wearing any type of red/white/blue or patriotic clothing or accessories.
I'm guessing that folks using the US flag as an accessory are generally pushing a fairly specific political belief.
I'm in Canada and a bunch of a-hole truckers and their followers blockaded the Capital and border crossings to try and blackmail the rest of the country. And of course they flew Canadian flags everywhere to pretend like they were being patriotic.
I love my country and my flag, but if I see some truck driving around with a Canadian flag I know it's probably some Fox-News watching Trump fanboy who was trying to extort the rest of the country which is pretty damn un-Canadian to me.
I asked them once "In terms of our political parties, who provided the greatest opposition to the Civil Rights era marches and the Civil Rights Act itself?" Their answer "Republicans of course!".
And they were right of course! (well kinda right anyway)
The real divide was the former Confederacy vs the rest of the country. Because the South was Democratic there were a lot more D in opposition than R.
But it was a Democratic President who pushed it. But if you look among legislators in the former Confederacy, Republicans were more likely to oppose it. And similarly outside, Republicans were more likely to oppose it.
So saying Republicans were more opposed isn't really wrong.
I asked them which state probably had the most slaves. Their answer "Texas, of course!"
That feels more like trivia, particularly considering the different populations at the time.
I asked them "What is inflation" they answered "Prices going up". I asked what causes it and they said "Greedy corporations".
To be fair, economists struggle with that too.
I asked them how the Jews got to Israel and they answered "They took it away from the Arabs after WW2"
Not entirely wrong. Not that the Jews sitting around in post-WWII refugee camps had many other good options.
I asked them "Did the Jews buy any of their land or live there before as far as you know?" Answer "No, they were invaders".
From the local's perspective, they kinda were invaders.
I asked if the arabs fought for the Axis or the Allies (had to explain what that meant) they said "Allies".
I asked about Freedom of Speech and they are mostly hostile "Free speech is used to bully minorities by old white men." I asked them what percentage they think old white guys are notably racist. Answer "99%". Okay what about Sexist? "95%". I asked how many are pedophiles. They answer "probably at least 50%" I asked if healthcare and education should be free. "Absolutely" I asked who should pay for it "Rich people." I asked how. "Income taxes and seizure of their assets" I asked if rich folks were better or worse than drug dealers "About the same"
At that point they're probably just screwing with you.
So, these days we skate and I don't talk to them about politics, history, or anything that would upset their fragile (and completely wrong) view of reality.
Just curious, do you think the COVID vaccine saved lives? Do you believe in AGW? Do you think Trump won in 2020?
Because I can find a lot of people on the right who espouse some pretty nutty beliefs on those topics, and they aren't the equivalent of the kids skateboarding, they're literally the leaders of the GOP and the associated media outlets.