On all sides of the bailout, can we stop turning dissenting viewpoints into radical caricatures?

[jpgray]

I think it's too easy to fall into two exclusive, radicalized camps on this issue--especially considering there is a great undercurrent of unspoken agreement here that's being wholly supplanted by all the contentious threads and personality wars. I'm not exempt from that behavior, as anyone following my posts on the subject could easily prove. :P I've found, however, from talking more politely and concretely to people that in almost all cases their position isn't as simplistic and far from mine as I first imagined.

Every point of view on the bailout has at some time complained of being misrepresented. So what gets us all radicalized on both sides?

I'd argue that it's assuming intent. We assume we know exactly where a poster is coming from based on even the briefest and most general of posts. All too often even the most implicit tenor of being "for" or "against" prompts us to place a poster on one extreme pole of the debate, to which he or she likely doesn't even belong. This makes the discussion go too often like this:

Person 1: I'm terrified about this bailout not passing. There may be serious consequences to inaction.
Person 2: So you believe all the chicken littles claiming the sky is falling? Did you believe there were WMDs in Iraq too?

Person 1: I'm glad the bailout failed. It's wrongheaded and may make things worse.
Person 2: So you want a new depression? You want to fuck over the middle class?

Person 1 in both cases is saying nothing like what he or she is accused of saying by Person 2. Person 2 refuses in both cases to recognize a middle ground. Any argument that isn't perceived to agree wholly with Person 2's position is thrown all the way in with the most extreme form of the dissenting position. Then it gets yelled at. This strangles honest debate on the issue, as there is widespread middle ground here. Many recognize both that this bailout is extremely wrongheaded -and- that inaction carries with it significant risk.

In other words, Person 1 and Person 2 could agree on almost everything in both examples, but won't see it due to Person 2's knee-jerk caricatures of Person 1's position. This ramps up the stakes of what should be a friendly debate to the point that both sides are actively encouraged to misrepresent each other in a misguided attempt to "win" rhetorical points.

Let's not pretend we all fall into either one extreme position or the other. Let's not pretend that this is a black or white issue. When that's the basis for discussion, almost nothing worthwhile gets said.

[msongs]

1. well the call for a progressive alternative has been made here by many people nt

[Stinky The Clown]

4. Are you folding your arms on your chest while saying that?

Just askin'

[jpgray]

7. True. More than this, I'd wager the vast majority of this board would prefer another bill

Fear of this one failing doesn't mean a total love affair with -this- bailout, nor does it mean complete trust of Bush administration warnings. On the other side, satisfaction at this bill's failure doesn't mean a total love affair with the possibility of a severe recession, nor does it indicate indifference to the vast potential suffering of the lower classes.

[pnwmom]

2. This is too reasonable. Thanks anyway!

;)

[jpgray]

6. It's a weird and wild time at DU these days.

I can't wait for Thursday. :D

[Stinky The Clown]

3. You're very right

Even when one says "I have no earthly idea what the right answer is", one finds oneself put into one extreme or the other.

Just to pour some leftover lamp oil on the hot plate ....... this is how investors react when there is no clear action plan from The Powers That Be ..... and we get panic selling ..... and on the individual person level, we get bank runs.

None of it is rational. But it is all very, very, painfully real.

[jpgray]

5. It's extremely contagious behavior. I've found that to be true, at least.

:silly:

[entanglement]

8. Gotta ask you - Do you want a new depression or did you believe there were WMDs in Iraq

:evilgrin:

[jpgray]

11. :-P

[hfojvt]

9. except that there have been DUers cheering for a new Depression

Some have stated: "I already don't have squat, so I have nothing to lose"
or "the poor are already getting screwed, so they don't have anything to lose" or "I am prepared to go through some hard times as long as Wall Street suffers".

So Person 2B is stating an actual position, although it may or may not be the position of person 1B.

As for Person 2A, it's not a bad thing to question the Bush administration, but we do know that these things have happened.

1. IndyMac (America's 8th largest thrift) failed
2. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were seized by the government after their stock dropped from $50 to $6 (and the SEC implemented short-selling restrictions)
3. Citibank borrowed several billion from United Arab Emirates at fairly steep rates
4. Lehman brothers failed
5. Merrill Lynch and another firm (whose name escapes me) were bought by Bank of America at bargain prices.
6. AIG failed (and was bailed out)
7. WaMu, America's largest thrift, failed
8. Wachovia, Americas 5th largest bank, is in trouble and will perhaps be bought by the largest.

None of which is really germaine to the point you were making about certain strawman arguments, but I wanted to make a list. Since person 1A did claim to be "terrified", person 2A is not wrong about the belief in Chicken Littles, but it would seem that the CL's claims have some basis.

But this bailout issue is not much different than any of DU's other wars where many on either side would rather attack the fools on the other side than discuss or try to understand somebody with a different POV.

[jpgray]

10. Wall St. is finally the target of focused popular rage, so we'll see some bluster and spleen-venting

All the righteous manifestos cheering a depression express mostly a nebulous antagonism to our particular brand of capitalism; I doubt they really would welcome a severe heightening of the contradictions or a true depression. Why do some claim to, or seem to? For some reason on this issue these folks resort to the tools of activism rather than the tools of rational debate. They see it as their mission to point out how fundamentally wrong the system is, rather than admit that its collapse could be devastating to the innocent as well as the guilty. The worst part of that behavior is the "I've lost everything" threads--I can't believe on a progressive board that people are responding "shouldn't have played the game, dipshit!"

Do they really mean that someone who worked for 40 years in a shit job and socked away a little for retirement deserves to be wiped out? I would suspect not, but for some people on DU this will be all about the opportunity to torpedo the system by means of this crisis. Part of that, they seem to think, is attacking all participants in that system; innocent or guilty.

All in all, the true number of such cheerleaders is beyond minute. Most of them, once you get past the self-righteous talking points, don't want to see a depression. They just don't want to be bullied into seeming acceptance of saving a system they hate.