Is Today’s Self-Help Teaching Everyone to Be a Jerk?

domer76 said:
Nothing wrong with any of that. One does not have to be a jerk when looking out for oneself.

One of the best pieces of advice I ever got, actually I read it in a stoic reference, is to learn how to say no. Too many times in life, we say yes to things we never wanted to do in the first place. It can breed anxiety and resentment for getting roped into things we didn’t wish to be involved in to begin with.
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I agree, it can go both ways. Clearly our problem today is too many going along with Trump's fascism.
 
Hume said:
There’s a certain flavor of advice that is dominating the self-help best-seller list. These books have titles like “The Courage to Be Disliked” and “Set Boundaries, Find Peace.” They tell readers not to worry so much about letting people down, not to answer those calls from aggravating friends, not to be afraid of being the villain.

This all becomes more alarming when you think of the best-seller list as a mirror of the social moment, which some historians say it may be.


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Like most things in life the concepts may be fine but how they are executed is something else entirely. Example "The courage to be disliked" could result in people being assholes but it might also help those people who always say yes to things because they are afraid of being disliked. Sometimes you have to say and do things people aren't going to like but you have to do them especially if saying or doing those things are necessary or good for you to do.
 
T. A. Gardner said:
Never claimed that either. My standard line on that subject is the far Right is extremely violent individually. A lone Rightwing extremist can rack up the body count. On the other hand, the far Left is just as violent but only in large numbers or a mob. They riot, destroy property, commit arson, graffiti everything in sight, wreck businesses, and injure dozens even hundreds of people. But they usually don't kill many people like the extreme Right does.


When the lives of hundreds, thousands, of people are destroyed because their livelihoods and businesses are destroyed, or they're beaten into cripples, it's just as egregious and evil as if they were murdered. Some lone Rightwinger crazy shoots and kills say 10 people. That's evil and terrible. A mob of Leftwing extremists riot in some downtown and burn blocks of buildings, smash every window in sight, burn cars, damage and destroy property, fight the police, and thump on anyone unfortunate enough to get caught in things causing billions in damage. That's evil and terrible. I see ZERO difference.

Byrd is an incompetent idiot. He should have been fired long before that fuck up for his previous fuck ups. Explain to me how a police officer, and a lieutenant and supervisor level officer at that, can shoot someone and leave the scene of that shooting even as half-a-dozen other officers remained there to deal with the person shot and the people around her?

We know he did that. He admitted to it. How can a cop that shot someone just leave the scene of that shooting and not face consequences?
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See and that last part says it all., Republicans are tough on crime, unless they're the ones doing it.

Thanks, man. You never fail to disappoint. trump could shoot a Democrat, execution style on the white house lawn and you're just say, "he had it coming".
 
LurchAddams said:
See and that last part says it all., Republicans are tough on crime, unless they're the ones doing it.

Thanks, man. You never fail to disappoint. trump could shoot a Democrat, execution style on the white house lawn and you're just say, "he had it coming".
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Like that unarmed woman murdered in cold blood by police on jan 6?
 
Yakuda said:
Like that unarmed woman murdered in cold blood by police on jan 6?
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Yeah, all the black people that initiated the BLM riots were unarmed too. If you're committing the crime, you'd better be willing to face the consequences like the 3 people Rittenhouse shot, amirite? He "left the scene" too. Didn't seem to bother you trumptards much.

Crime is terrible to Republicans unless they're the ones doing it!
 
Hume said:
I agree, it can go both ways. Clearly our problem today is too many going along with Trump's fascism.
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That’s the danger, all right. Similar pattern in Italy and Germany in the early twentieth century. They appealed to those who felt left out and left behind and who dreamed of mythical former glory days.
 
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