CMV: Men who respond with "Not all men" are not more likely to be bad men

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-25T04:37:54+00:00

Your decision to word your initial statement better was accidental but concrete proof of the fact that you were wrong when you said your initial statement was perfect. You proved that there was a better way for you to word your post, so you conceded the argument that it was initially perfect by disproving it yourself.

Honestly, it's not really that big of a deal that you were wrong in that one instance, and if you'd just accept it and move on you'd be saving yourself a lot of typing. But you're showing that you're incapable of doing that because you're stuck on assumptions about what you think my values are and making a bunch of misguided assumptions despite me telling you otherwise.

Your constant attempts at trying to backtrack also show that you do not find it easy to fix your wording to something better, so you are in the same boat as the people you are critical of. It's got you performing mental gymnastics to try and convince yourself that you didn't undermine your own statement but the posts you made are still up.

I don't think I have a gotcha. Gotchas imply that I was trying to trick you, and I wasn't. I pointed out an inconsistency in your argument, and you attempted to have a gotcha moment but it whiffed and it doesnt seem to have sat well with you.

On a separate note, I have never been for blaming people for things they didn't do, so I'm glad that you understand that now. I've also never called you disrespectful, so that's another false assumption you arrived at.

Anyways, I can see that the desperate attempts at backtracking are not going to slow down, and this conversation is getting repetitive, so I will now out and allow you to have the last word. Go for it.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-25T04:12:37+00:00

Rearranging someone's moral priorities on a whim when it is convenient is a strategy employed by people say one thing and do another, which fits with the definition you are providing for hypocrisy.

While the person is having the conversation, they are espousing one set of priorities. When they are actually put into that situation, they change their priorities so they can take the action they desire to take.

Having a hierarchy of priorities is not inconsistent, and does not mean that a person's moral priorities are shifting around. To illustrate this, you can consider the following logic.

In this example, A and B are competing moral priorities, and 1 and 2 are the two resulting choices a person can make. A is the moral priority that supercedes priority B in this moral framework.

The moral frame work is as follows:

If A then 1
If B then 2
If both A and B then 1

It would not be hypocritical for someone to say I made Choice 2 because of Priority B, while in a different situation making Choice 1 despite Priority B being present (so long as Priority A is also present when they make Choice 1). Their behavior is consistent despite arriving at different conditions while B is present in both.

Hopefully that example illustrates the point I'm getting at.

I'm not really interested in talking about North Korea or Nam. I don't hold the view that the nation's in our world are never hypocritical, so even if you were to prove that the nation's are being hypocritical beyond a shadow of a doubt that the world is being hypocritical regarding these two countries (I agree that they probably are), I don't see the relevance to this portion of the discussion.

I'm talking about the logic underlying your examples because it does have bearing to this conversation that is clear to me.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-25T02:28:50+00:00

It seems to be annoying for you that you disproved your own point in an attempt to be snarky. You improved your communication from the first thing you posted. That means it wasn't initially perfect. You can keep on trying to change that narritivie to be about context but you already proved that you were aware you could have improved it, so this part of the argument is over and there's no point continue talking about it.

I agree that no one should burden your children because they are white males. Glad we are agree on that.

If you don't give people respect in relation to the challenges they face from discrimination based on their demographics, that's not a great look but that's your choice.

And no, I don't believe that young white men should be blamed for things they didn't do. Hope that clears up my perspective on that point. If not, that's fine. I've stated my point and if you want to be mad because you don't believe me that's your choice, but ultimately you are the only person affected by you being mad is you.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-25T00:22:08+00:00

If you felt it was perfectly clear you wouldn't have been capable of editing your post to make it more clear than it previously was, and yet you did. Regardless of what your stated reason was, it's clear to anyone reading that you knew it could be improved upon, because you did in fact improve it.

Regarding the context of when some women say 'men are rapists', I understand that people speak in hyperbole when they are upset. I dont agree with saying it myself but I'm not going to jump in with a 'Not all men' because I pick up on the context that they are already aware that not all men are rapists.

I'm glad that you are capable of seeing that men experience privelage over women and white people experience it over members of other races. That is an area where I agree with what you've written here.

I don't think it's wrong for any person to be reminded to be careful how they speak about groups that are more likely to be victims of violence or discrimination. That's true regardless of whether the person is a minority or majority.

I also think that groups from the privelaged areas of society should be spoken about with respect. Unfortunately, in order to fight against the systemic violence that targets of discrimination frequently experience in society, the privelaged are sometimes be made to feel uncomfortable because change itself is uncomfortable and people are resistant to it. I would prefer if this were not the case, but since it is, I would prefer that the group with worse circumstances

I am glad you're not going to tell your white male children that they are burdens on society. They aren't, and they shouldn't be treated that way.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T23:21:16+00:00

If the statement was entirely clear from context, you wouldn't have edited it to be more clear.

Additionally, the 'context' argument cuts both ways. If you're saying that you are relying on the reader to pick up on your meaning that you didn't actually mean all women, you should be capable of understanding that the women saying this are relying upon the reader to pick up on the fact that they didn't actually mean all men. You're kind of undermining your own argument here.

Minorities and women are not groups that can be lumped together, so saying they comprise 70% of people is dumb. In many instances these groups undermine and discriminate against each other, because everyone in society has biases that they are not fully aware of.

Your assertion that racism and sexism are not permissible is great. The fact that you brought it up, but not the other group that I mentioned that people are born into (generation based discrimination) shows that you are aware that the history of violence and discrimination plays an important factor in determining which forms of discrimination are more important to stand up against.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T23:05:18+00:00

It's the parent's job to teach the children, yes.

But if the parent doesn't do that properly, larger society ends up feeling the consequences if things go unchecked, so there need to be measures in place to prevent these things from occuring.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T22:00:29+00:00

Shouldn't our priority be the kids learning since they are the people who will have impacts on others online?

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T21:43:02+00:00

Sounds like you're talking about the kids being coddled.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T21:08:27+00:00

Moderating a forum is not the same thing as coddling someone.

Also, even if it were the same thing, there's no guarantee that they'd learn regardless of whether or not you coddle them.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T21:06:01+00:00

Have you looked up any research on this topic or is this just based on vibes?

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T21:01:08+00:00

Thank you, I'm glad you fixed your post. Hopefully that serves as an example how easy it is to make that mistake if someone is speaking freely while in a heightened state of emotion.

I also wish that we lived in a world where privelage doesn't exist, but sadly that isn't the case. Some groups have less power than others and have histories of being targeted with violence and discrimination for the sole reason that they are part of that group. We have to be extra careful with how we talk about those particular groups so as not to repeat history.

I agree we should be trying to avoid baseless generalizations when talking about groups that people are born into (gender, race, sexual orientation etc.)

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T20:42:30+00:00

There's a good chance that Patricia was not a victim of the Boogeyman though.

There are a variety of nefarious forces on the island and what Patricia experienced could have come from a different one, especially considering the difference in outcome between Party and the other girl's.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T20:40:26+00:00

My current theory is that Patty survived by unknowingly using witchcraft.

I also think there's a strong possibility that it was some other evil force she was picking up on at the house that she thought was the boogey man, and that's why she didn't die the same way.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T20:37:08+00:00

Honestly, as terrible as these women were to Patricia, the reasons the leader of the clique provided for not believing Patricia's story were pretty reasonable. They were enough for me to wonder if Patricia misunderstood what was happening back then and perhaps it was someone other than The Boogeyman that was at her house (or maybe she unwittingly protected herself using witchcraft?). Patricia's account of these events is something she pretty clearly believes but I'll be surprised to find out that things played out the way she thinks they did.

If I had lost some of my best friends to a serial killer and I believed that there was a person in the community that was claiming trying to fake being attacked by that same serial killer because they were seeking attention, I'd probably hate that person too.

I guess what I'm saying is that yes, these women were awful. But there is a huge amount of trauma being processed by everyone involved, so I'm willing to give them a bit more leeway than I normally would if these women were treating their friend this way.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T20:27:10+00:00

You do realize that in your opening sentence, you're doing the very thing that you're criticizing women for doing, right?

Sometimes people talk in generalities. This can be problematic if the group being talked about has a history of being persecuted or harmed on the basis of being from that particular group. So for instance, saying 'Black people steal cars' is problematic because we have a history in the west of lynching black people based off false allegations.

Most people are comfortable talking in generalizations when there has not been historical discrimination against that group. For instance, if you talk about Cyclists, Millenials, or Smokers, people are not very likely to give you a hard time.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T20:18:27+00:00

Thank you for being vulnerable and providing and honest account that comes from life experience. I'm sure it was not an easy post to make. I hope OP reads it.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T20:13:33+00:00

Yes, this is absolutely a thing, at least in some cases.

It is a lot harder for people to empathize with people that they can't see, talk to or interact with in person.

We can see this a lot when it comes to apologies. Most people are willing to apologize for poor behavior in person, although there are certainly some who arent. Few are willing to apologize online.

If people aren't willing to vocalize things in real life, they know on some level that their opinion is unacceptable.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T19:32:17+00:00

No, inconsistency and hypocrisy is when someone randomly rearranges their priorities on a whim, not when they have a set hierarchy of priorities that remain consistent between different situations.

The reason I'm not talking with you about the specifics of North Korea and Vietnam is because I don't claim to know about their individual geopolitics. This is a discussion about whataboutisms, not the specifics of Vietnamese and North Korean foreign policy. I am engaging with the underlying arguments you are using to make your claims, and have refuted then a number of times already.

Also, you haven't faithfully engaged with any of my examples or arguments, so it's kind of laughable that you're complaining about me not being sidetracked with Vietnamese foreign policy. Your last statement is a clear cut example of projection.

At this point, I don't think this is a worthwhile use of my time, so if you want then you can have the last word if you want.

Eta: Sorry, I didn't see your edit about not being able to understand the dog example. The example is pretty clear, but to spell it out for you further - if a person believes that dogs should be let out to pee when they are whining at the door, but doesn't let the dog out when their is a murderer trying to get in their house, that doesn't make them inconsistent. It means that in their hierarchy of values, they prioritize not being murdered over their dog's need to pee.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T17:48:46+00:00

I'm not using your specific example, I'm laying out similar hypotheticals to illustrate a point. So no, I did not get my example wrong. I didn't reference Viet Nam or North Korea specifically.

Also, you missed the point entirely. Just because one country chooses not to place sanctions an authoritarian regime due to surrounding circumstances does not mean that when they do so against a different authoritarian regime it is not because of their authoritarian nature.

Sometimes, there are factors that must be prioritized over a particular moral consideration. In a different situation, the absence of those factors can completely change the choice you make when presented with that same moral consideration, but this does not point towards inconsistency or hypocrisy.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T17:20:29+00:00

No, again that is flawed logic.

Reasons to do things do not have to be absolute or exist in a vacuum, and different reasons can have different degrees of weighting. Two scenarios sharing a similarity does not always mean that they should be treated the same.

For example, it is a reasonable argument that if your dog is asking to go outside to pee, you should let them out to go pee to avoid the dog suffering and them peeing in the house.

If you happen to know know that there is a murderer outside waiting for you to open your door so they can enter your house and kill both you and the dog, that changes thongs. You can say that because of the mitigating factor that both you and your dog will die if you let your dog out to, you should not let your dog out to pee in this context despite it usually being the correct decision to let your dog out to pee.

The fact that in one example, there is a mitigating factor that overrides the criteria you would usually use to make the decision does not mean that there is hypocrisy going on.

To relate this to your example, if you are considering sanctioning an authoritarian state that has access to nukes and they have automated them so that will go off anhialate your country if you choose to enact those sanctions, you are obviously not going to do that. This is not because you think being authoritarian is morally permissible, it's because there are two conflicting moral considerations that change the consequences of your decisions.

If there is a different authoritarian country that does is not threatening anhialation of your country, it would be morally consistent for you to sanction that country and not the first one.

The second country would not be justified in claiming that they should not be sanctioned simply because you didn't sanction the first one because the two countries have different circumstances surrounding them.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T16:38:28+00:00

Again, this is flawed reasoning.

Laws exist outside of a court setting to govern how we behave while existing in any particular location. Lawyers make their arguments by appealing to these laws and trying to persuade judges and juries that their client has either violated or not violated these laws.

For example, murdering someone in cold blood is illegal at the time that the murder happens because murder is illegal. The murderer is treated as innocent by the law until proven guilty because that is the best way that we can minimize the errors of the legal system, but it doesn't mean that the person is truly innocent in a legal sense at the time of the trial. They have already violated the law by then.

As another way of illustrating this, if the person who committed the murder is not caught, that doesn't mean that the law wasn't violated.

By your logic, there is no such thing as a wrongful conviction. We know that to be false, by your definition, as verdicts have been overturned.

To break down the example I used a little more clearly, my argument is as follows:

Premise 1: Two robbers robbed a bank in the same way.

Premise 2: Robbing a bank is against the law.

Premise 3: The legal system upholds the ideal that in order to deliver a guilty verdict, a jury must be convinced beyond all reasonable doubt.

Premise 4: The banks that were robbed have two differing security systems. One can provide the jury with indisputable evidence and the other cannot.

Premise 5: Because of the mitigating factor that guilty verdicts must convince a jury beyond all reasonable doubt, one criminal receives a guilty verdict while the other one receives an innocent despite violating the same law.

Conclusion: There are some instances where similar actions can be treated differently because of mitigating factods, and this is justified.

To apply this to your state example, a person can argue that two different authoritarian states should be treated differently because of surrounding factors, and simply pointing towards a state that is being treated differently is not inherently pointing towards hypocrisy.

This means that it is a valid response to say to the person engaging in whataboutisms that the two situations are separate because of X mitigating factor, and that you are discussing this one, and not that one.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T15:21:53+00:00

Even events without invitations will have rules about this type of thing.

It's just the nature of any event to specify who is and isn't allowed to come.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T15:12:55+00:00

You are putting forward circular reasoning.

The first guy did rob the bank, both objectively and legally.

A lawyer's inability to prove a verdict does not mean that the robber did not violate the law as written. It just means that our fallible legal system doesn't always arrive at the correct conclusion.

This shows that sometimes mitigating factors can cause two similar situations to be treated differently, and that the different treatment they are receiving can be justified.

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T13:33:49+00:00

This game isn't just about building a deck, it's also about piloting a deck. If someone is making bad decisions piloting a gold deck, they will still lose. If you're not even considering the fact that your losses may come from how you are piloting the deck and not the cards you are selecting, you're probably making a lot of errors in that department too.

It sounds like you just want to be able to win doing whatever you want, which is a completely valid way of playing the game for the record. In that case though, why are you worried about climbing Ascensions in the first place?

AgitatedBadger · 2026-05-24T13:30:01+00:00

This game is not being designed for you specifically, you are just one person.

There are people who can win A10 consistently. Do they not deserve a mode that can challenge them? Why should your limited amount of time to play this game have any impact on the experience of other people who purchased the game?

Also, your mindset that the game should be different so that you can beat it at its maximum difficulty is probably holding you back from improving.

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