I don’t think they’d disagree with anything you said there. Their problem, I realize, has nothing to do with flouride. It has to do with the duty of government. They clearly realize that flouride is good for teeth. Maybe they don’t quite understand the sheer amount of flouride required for it to be dangerous, but w/e. The problem is, for them, is that they’re not entirely convinced that governments should be trying to protect their citizens. There’s a belief at work here that an individual shouldn’t need assistance with their wellbeing. Or at least not from a large body that doesn’t have any personal relation to the individual. So the paternalism that is assumed to be good for most people because it has a very high likelihood of doing good, a good that vastly outweighs any potential likely con, is assumed to be bad. This is because that’s a liberty and a responsibility that the government has over the public that could be exploited or neglected, and they believe that a vast body like the government suffers so little influence from the public that should something go wrong, the people would be powerless to stop it.

Not too strange of a phenomenon if one considers what populism focuses on, the fabrication of divides in order to drive tribal responses from it’s followers.Trump’s rhetoric is only one variety of it that happens to be very effective at creating that divide, those that are swayed shouldn’t really be seen as people that support all of his nastiest views, but as people that have been taken in by that sense of tribalism.

The loss of community is increasingly problematic for individuals in this day in age. There exists too many groups vying for our attention, many of which being communities that span across the globe. And with all these options, local communities may not always seem preferential to these global ones due to comparative size or accessibility. However, they still generally offer much more, and can prevent people from feeling isolated in their lives. Populist campaigns seek to take these people that are divorced from a community, often socially isolated people, and give them a group that seemingly supports them. So long as it’s welcoming, it doesn’t really matter who’s at the head of it, nor it’s beliefs.

I feel the fact that older people that aren’t quite retirement age and younger men being the people that are most likely to vote for Trump kinda speaks to this theory. I feel like these groups are the most at risk when it comes to developing rewarding communities, so a group like MAGA could be appealing to them.

Ok, I see the comment now. Yes, you seem to provide a source, but you claim that the source shows that humans are affected by prolonged exposure. Obviously that’s true, but comes with the obvious caveat that our exposure is nowhere near dangerous levels. I’m no expert, but I have some experiencing in parsing papers and trying to determine legitimacy so I’ll take a stab at what it’s saying.

In this review, it mentions that all the animals studied, problems arose when calculating the amount of fluoride measured against the body weight of the animal. Developmental toxicity occurs at ~13.2 mg/kg of body weight. A litre of water is advised to have .7 mg of flouride in the US. While some states have more or less, they’re all around there. Now, you tell how many litres of water you’d have to drink to actually reach that level of concentration in your body. I’ll give you a hint, it’s at least several times your body weight.

This review also mentions that most flouride is excreted through urine or feces, and 99% of what is preserved is found in the teeth. I didn’t read the studies on what the percentages that are excreted are, but since this review concludes that flouridated water is a non-issue, I’m gonna assume that it’s substantial enough to not be an issue when it comes to flouride buildup.

Here’s the thing though, this study is a review of other studies, why that’s relevant is because of some of the epidemiological data that’s brought up could still show that flouride is bad. However, All studies comparing populations that this review looks at have significant flaws, flaws that the review goes into. The review essentially concludes that all the epidemiological data from other studies are garbage. And rightly so, since a study trying to determine IQ between very different populations is next to impossible to make accurate.

Anyway, the short of it is that this review does not help your case. I’d say if anything, it makes it pretty clear that flouride is not an issue, and that if you’re looking for data to say otherwise, this study recommends much more substantial epidemiological research to be carried out, unlike the epidemiological data they reference in the review.

To get more on topic, I don’t believe most people would have looked more in depth at the article so perhaps they moved the goalposts when they were talking to you. That’s fair to criticize them, but then again, what you’re saying is also not entirely honest. Perhaps you didn’t mean to be dishonest, but still, that just falls under the category of “speak within your limitations”. Acknowledge that you don’t understand or can’t interpret the data. Maybe just ask for help clarifying points. Because what you had said was much too broad for the discussion you were having, and wasn’t remotely helpful, and was, for a lack of a better term, misinformation.

Honestly, the best tactic for catching yourself doing this is to assess others’ goals before attempting to comment on them. For example, don’t start with assuming that governments across the world are proactively poisoning their population. Assume the obvious and go from there. Like considering that governments want healthy populations that are good workforces and produce high quality goods in order for them to compete at the world stage for power, clout, and money. This means producing educated adults, not mindless labour drones. Thus, if there existed credible studies (because not all studies are credible, as this review and many others point out) to increase intellectual output and reduce costs of infrastructure by removing flouride from water (as you wouldn’t bother putting flouride in the water), you can bet that the government would be recommending or even forcing the elemination of flouridated water. There’s just nothing substantial to gain otherwise. Clean teeth or only so much of a positive, and governments, again, do not want a mindless population. We’re in the information age, manual labour is worth a fraction of the GDP output as high quality, educated work is.

There are a couple things that seem honest, but most of this is just rage baiting or spreading misinformation (fluoride, really? If you’re gonna talk about it being discussed you gotta bring scientific sources to the table). Like, I get it, there’re no decent places to actually discuss politics in this day in age because every space is an echo chamber, but you don’t have to actively goad people into engaging with you. Just try to act like an adult, do your research, and talk within the bounds of your knowledge. Keep in mind that the spaces you’re talking in are often echo chambers that come with some territorial behaviour, unfortunately.

All-in-all, if you want people to be nicer to you, you gotta be nicer to them. Also bring sources if you believe the audience won’t believe you.

Yah I mean, if your narrow understanding of what war is is Trumpets trying to take over the white house than yah, I guess one would hate the idea of using violence for the greater good.

Still, that sort of sacrifice should be expected if you want to make changes in your country (the US)

Lol. Us vs them mentality has stretched back since the beginning of the homo genus… probably before that. Racism is just an extension of that but with larger communities. It’s more accurate to say “The Christian Nationalist Views of Inferior People have Roots Stemming from the Concept of Race”. Which is kinda obvious and doesn’t make much of a headline.

I can’t see how relying on the preference from North Korea could possibly help one’s election campaign.

I hate pacifists, man. They always try to publicly shame you by making it seem like violence is never justified… stupid deontological thinking

While I’m sure there would be a net positive, it’s also a completely absurd hypothetical. To get rid of hateful and rightwing propaganda networks, you’d have to completely change the political donor system in the US. You’d have to change the political landscape, you’d have to change the population, the rules on election and numerous other things.

You can’t just get rid of something that’s so beneficial to those in power. You have to completely remove that power in its entirety.

What are you talking about dude? Have you read anything regarding the shooter?

Need a source on that or I’ll just assume you’re lying through your teeth. As literally every major news outlet is reporting he made that donation

If radical change is what’s necessary. Then civil wars should be on the table. Besides, I’m sure the shooter’s goal wasn’t to depolarize the masses.

I think, looking at what has been published on him, it’s pretty clear as to why he shot Trump. For one, his personality lended itself to a hero complex. He was really nice, shy, intelligent, informed, and helpful. He clearly had respect for the Republican party, but given the info on his friend group, it was likely due to peer pressure. This is mostly made obvious by his political donation to the Progressive Turnout Project he made. A project that no conservative really should want to encourage.

In all likelihood, this guy saw the direction the States was headed in and realized there was no way to stop it from imploding without resorting to extreme political violence. I imagined he was upset with the fact that he wouldn’t be able to do much through official channels in his life, so he made the ultimate sacrifice to will the change himself. That’s why this guy’s a hero in my books, not because he took a shot at Trump, but because he realized there’s nothing any of us normies can do about the States’ political situation through normal means, so he went above and beyond. He probably spent some time weighing the options as to whom to shoot, and realized Trump was the better pick.

Alright, have fun, just remember; don’t drink the Kool-aid!

If you squint, the Star Citizen logo kinda looks like the symbol for The People’s Temple

Yes, I get that, but at what point do you start considering future children over the current children? Accelerationists are not deontologists, they are consequentialists. A child lost now is valued against the amount of children saved at some calculated point later.

No, the best way to convince an accelerationist that accelerationism is not the right play is to show that there will be no decently positive outcome. Which I’m inclined to agree with, since I can only imagine the continual election of populist figures such as Trump will only increase the divide between voters of the two parties. This’ll create more violence, possibly destabilize the US, and could destabilize large parts of the western world due to policy, military vacuum, and emboldening of alt right groups. Now measure all those consequences against the possibility of an improvement in the political system and multiply that by likelihood. This, to me, seems like a very low gain, for the high likelihood of increased losses. So it should be preferable for accelerationists to go with Biden, since he’s likely to bring about accelerationists goals too, but with less risk, but much slower.

Regardless, it doesn’t change the fact that it’s incredibly hard to vote earnestly rather than strategically.

Idk if I’m back on the accelerationist train or not yet. Not that I can vote in the States, so it doesn’t matter. Regardless, I feel like it would be hard for anyone that even slightly cares about the future to vote for either of these two earnestly. As a progressive, you’d have to weigh the pros and cons of the value of the Dems possibly reevaluating and restructuring if Trump gets back in, vs the absolute abysmal reactions and policies that Trump will cause if he does, especially outside the US. But then if you vote the Dems in again, the neo-nazis around the world will feel less empowered, and there will be less terrible decision making in the short term. All at the cost of Dems not having to change the status quo, and effectively being the lesser evil for the foreseeable future.

Actually, I don’t envy the American voter. And I certainly wouldn’t want to vote in this election.