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[Travis B.]

Well, I certainly wouldn’t call myself a ‘neoliberal’: for one thing I believe that regulation is often extremely important, whereas neoliberals (insofar as I understand their position at all) tend to strongly dislike it.

No one does. Regardless of their rhetoric, the smart "neoliberals" tend to support certain kinds of regulations. This is how they differ from idealistic libertarians. However, they selectively use regulations to strengthen market discipline instead of challenging it for the betterment of the weakest sections of society. This enshrines the exploitation of the poor into law.

The thing is by equating bradrn's political beliefs with neoliberalism you effectively ascribe political beliefs to him that he may not have simply on the basis of that neoliberals are commonly called 'centrist' and bradrn also describes himself as a centrist. On this basis you could call broad swaths of the population 'neoliberal' simply because they aren't right-wing but aren't consciously left-wing either.

[WeepingElf]

Well, I certainly wouldn’t call myself a ‘neoliberal’: for one thing I believe that regulation is often extremely important, whereas neoliberals (insofar as I understand their position at all) tend to strongly dislike it.

No one does. Regardless of their rhetoric, the smart "neoliberals" tend to support certain kinds of regulations. This is how they differ from idealistic libertarians. However, they selectively use regulations to strengthen market discipline instead of challenging it for the betterment of the weakest sections of society. This enshrines the exploitation of the poor into law.

The thing is by equating bradrn's political beliefs with neoliberalism you effectively ascribe political beliefs to him that he may not have simply on the basis of that neoliberals are commonly called 'centrist' and bradrn also describes himself as a centrist. On this basis you could call broad swaths of the population 'neoliberal' simply because they aren't right-wing but aren't consciously left-wing either.

"Neoliberalism" is an ill-defined term that is used by radical leftists to put all their less leftist political opponents in one big sack and bash them. Everything from Greens and social democrats to liberals and conservatives and sometimes even fascists are called "neoliberals" by certain folks, though some exclude fascists because there is really no way of considering them a kind of "liberals" without making an utter fool of oneself.

[Ares Land]

Neoliberal is a useful label, you can use it to describe politicians or policies and have some idea of what they're about.

But that's about it; it's also ill-defined and mostly pejorative (though some neoliberal have tried to reclaim the word and use it positively.)

[Raphael]

I got vaccinated (COVID, flu, hepatitis B) yesterday and I’m paying for it today.

Get better! (I'm assuming that by "paying", you mean unpleasant physical symptoms.)

[Raphael]

Oh, this might be of interest to most people on the board. I try to keep up with most of the conlang scratchpads. Your work certainly isn't newbie-ish. It's generally hard to interact on the conlanging thread, because most of them are like, great work, and it's hard to say anything but 'I'd like to see more of that'


It's easier to react to the politics! The politics threads here are usually very interesting. They tend to get a bit overheated, but that's true of all political discussions, and to be expected as people are knowledgeable and pretty clear on what they stand for. I think most everyone can learn something from them, I certainly did.

I agree -- when I do read the scratchpad threads I often find them interesting but I don't really know what to add to them (even though admittedly I tend to avoid reading walls of text).

Same.

[Ares Land]

Oh, FWIW the best example of a neoliberal is Macron (who isn't against government regulation).

He also will never use the word. Libéral (neo- part optional) is almost an insult in French.

[Travis B.]

Oh, FWIW the best example of a neoliberal is Macron (who isn't against government regulation).

Agreed.

He also will never use the word. Libéral (neo- part optional) is almost an insult in French.

I assume you mean French French and not Canadian French here (considering that their main center-left party is the Liberal party).

[Ares Land]

I assume you mean French French and not Canadian French here (considering that their main center-left party is the Liberal party).

As spoken in French, yes! Usage of libéral in Quebec must be interesting if there's any European French influence there at all.

[Travis B.]

I assume you mean French French and not Canadian French here (considering that their main center-left party is the Liberal party).

As spoken in French, yes! Usage of libéral in Quebec must be interesting if there's any European French influence there at all.

Apparently the provincial Parti libéral du Québec is more centrist than the federal Liberal party, at least according to the Wiki.

[Ares Land]

Apparently the provincial Parti libéral du Québec is more centrist than the federal Liberal party, at least according to the Wiki.

I don't know about now, but as I recall the PLQ was, in fact, neoliberal under Jean Charest.

[Travis B.]

Apparently the provincial Parti libéral du Québec is more centrist than the federal Liberal party, at least according to the Wiki.

I don't know about now, but as I recall the PLQ was, in fact, neoliberal under Jean Charest.

It should be noted in particular that once Jean Charest was the leader of the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada and only later joined the PLQ, and after leaving the PLQ ran as a competitor to Pierre Poilievre in the 2022 Conservative Party of Canada leadership election.

[Man in Space]

I got vaccinated (COVID, flu, hepatitis B) yesterday and I’m paying for it today.

Get better! (I'm assuming that by "paying", you mean unpleasant physical symptoms.)

Thank you! And yes, this is correct. Still having some issues today.

[Raphael]

Content Warning: real life sexualized violence against children

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Is anyone else kind of weirded out or creeped out by the contrast between the content of this Irish Times article and the specific photo of the person the article is about which they chose to illustrate the article? Not sure whether this even qualifies as banality of evil:

The Irish Times: Ballet teacher who sexually abused young girls is jailed for seven years

https://www.irishtimes.com/crime-law/co ... ven-years/

[Travis B.]

Is anyone else kind of weirded out or creeped out by the contrast between the content of this Irish Times article and the specific photo of the person the article is about which they chose to illustrate the article? Not sure whether this even qualifies as banality of evil:

The Irish Times: Ballet teacher who sexually abused young girls is jailed for seven years

https://www.irishtimes.com/crime-law/co ... ven-years/

Couldn't they've chosen something like a mugshot?...

[Raphael]

Couldn't they've chosen something like a mugshot?...

I dunno whether Ireland does mugshots. Publicly available mugshots seem to be largely a US thing. But yes, that was more or less my first thought, too.

[Travis B.]

Couldn't they've chosen something like a mugshot?...

I dunno whether Ireland does mugshots. Publicly available mugshots seem to be largely a US thing. But yes, that was more or less my first thought, too.

That photo looks like a marketing photo...

[Richard W]

You claimed that the board would go back to "Nazism". The ZBB is not a corporation or even some kind of cooperative. It's my personal forum, so your accusation is an attack on my personal integrity, as well as the admin work that keeps the board relatively benign.

Take it as a worry that you may lose control, leaving you only nuclear options.

[alice]

Alice: Thanks to my new laptop, I have brought my sound-change applier into the 20th century with modern programming techniques and methods.

Don't put words into my mouth, man I'm still trying!

[Travis B.]

Alice: Thanks to my new laptop, I have brought my sound-change applier into the 20th century with modern programming techniques and methods.

Don't put words into my mouth, man I'm still trying!

Do you believe that you have many cryptological problems involving a certain Bob?

[Man in Space]

Alice: Thanks to my new laptop, I have brought my sound-change applier into the 20th century with modern programming techniques and methods.

Don't put words into my mouth, man I'm still trying!

These were your words:

Thanks to my new laptop, I have brought my sound-change applier into the 20th century with modern programming techniques and methods.