This is *extremely* instructive My hard line is you have to believe that the world is better if I am alive Coates' hard line is that you have to use the proper pronouns. Coates' hard line is "my team has to win or you are beyond saving"

In the Ezra Klein interview, Coates plainly says that the vast majority of the right is on "the other side of the line" I say it is only those who celebrate murder (which all my favorite liberals tell me that is a tiny fraction of the left) This is good to know

I have to say that I like that Klein is really fighting to figure out how to navigate a world if a huge chunk of the people his party needs to reach are "over the line" https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

It is also extremely funny that Ezra asks Coates why so many black men voted for Trump and Coates is like "yeah, sexism is a very real force"

Coates seems determined to say "this will all go badly forever but we cannot compromise in any possible way to achieve anything we want"

It is also quite funny that, around 1:03:00, Ezra basically says that he wants to get back to a place where Democratic candidates happily lie to people about what they believe in order to get elected

He's talking about Obama saying "I'm against gay marriage" when they all knew he wasn't. In the context of this conversation, it seems like Ezra wants Democrats to say "I'm against trans issues" when they aren't.

@politicalmath Did he really say "epitaphs?"

@MoronPundit yeah

@politicalmath Epitaphs?

@aphofer that's what he said

@politicalmath I don't celebrate death, but I think we can rationally discuss whether a given person's existence is a net positive or negative for the world (as you put it "the world is a better place without them"). I think one can argue Coates is net negative. https://x.com/BayesianNuance/s...

@politicalmath Are the epitaphs carved into bullets?

@politicalmath Taking moral directives from Coates is like studying retail management under a BLM rioter.

@politicalmath Coates' Law: the number of epithets in the epitaph of a political celebrity doubles every 2 election cycles leading to increased propagandizing power and reduced tolerance. This trend has driven significant advances in political division and the rage baiting industry.

@politicalmath I agree with you, but at the same time, this tweet rings louder and louder in my ears, fueling my shame. https://x.com/MariGO2thepolls/...

@politicalmath I am quite convinced my mere existence puts me on the other side of TNCs line... https://x.com/AndrewCFollett/s...

@politicalmath “You have to believe the world is better if I am alive” There is a problem with this argument, and that problem is democracy itself. Coates is right not to believe this about me, and I’m right not to believe it about him.

@politicalmath I suspect Coates' line also includes celebrating death, he talks about state violence (war and policing) a lot. Consider how many cheered on the extralegal strikes on those fishing(?) boats recently, or otherwise treat state violence and its collateral entertainment.

@politicalmath People frame it as "Klein is smart, Coates is dumb" but that's not it. Klein wants to WIN, Coates wants to BE RIGHT. The motive is fundamental. That he's wrong and dumb is secondary.

@politicalmath "Epitaphs." 🤣 What a genius.

@politicalmath think he said "epitets, " meaning epithets. Guess Homer crossed the line in a big way.

@politicalmath There’s a joke in there about throwing epitaphs being inherently violent, what with the “being dead” prerequisite for having an epitaph. But I’m not clever enough to craft it.

@politicalmath Epithets are bad but also call people transphobia.

@politicalmath Defining epithets down

@politicalmath I choose one exception to this ruke: Unrepentant pedophiles. I’m not going to seek their destruction, but the world is far better off without them.

@politicalmath Hope he isn't hurling the headstone, as well!

@politicalmath Hard to argue with that line being drawn at dehumanization. It's a foundational boundary for any civil society. On a related note, Justin Marks often talks about how markets can't function without a baseline of shared humanity either. Spot on.

@politicalmath You can't expect stupid people to be reasonable. He is driven by emotion. Everything is downstream from his feelings. Justice, compromise, these are concepts they'll pay lip service to but conflict with the service of their ego.

@politicalmath Regular people on all sides do not condone political violence. That’s a very online thing to see bloodthirsty freaks

@politicalmath Coates has leveraged victimhood into a decent career writing slop that no one actually reads

@politicalmath The political divide remains unbridgeable as long as this remains the dynamic at play https://x.com/Trailblaze777/st...