And in spite of his flaws, it's possible that he had some good qualities as well, or at least aspired to them. So maybe those other qualities were what he looked for in the characters he played.
Of course they both had a change of heart- was it true change or they saw the direction of the political winds? Who knows?
I don’t know Chuck Norris’s views on LGBT. But if he was a self proclaimed “born again Christian” and a rabid Trump supporter, I can only guess. But I no more expect people who were insulted by what he said (which I personally don’t know) to give him more grace or reverence than I do is a Black man who couldn’t give two shits about a dead racist podcaster.
Other people no more need to “contextualize” homophobia than I feel a need to “contextualize” the racism of a dead podcaster.
I do believe that Obama was 100% cool with gay marriage, but believed it was politically foolhardy to admit that publicly and in policy positions, but was able to advocate for his true feelings once the political climate changed. Still not awesome, but understandable from an electoral perspective.
I'm not really sure about Clinton. I would guess he's personally in favor of gay marriage and gays in the military today, but hard to say what his views might have been in the 90s (as I was a teenager at the time who wasn't all that interested in politics).
Also on supposedly-liberal people doing homophobic things: let's also not forget that California voters banned gay marriage statewide in 2008. 2008! And this was a ballot measure where all voters got a say, not something passed by the legislature.
DADT was a significant improvement over the status quo of "we ask, you tell, and then you get dishonorably discharged". Considering it evidence of homophobia is revisionism. Did it go far enough? No. Was it a good step towards where we wanted to go? Yes.
Sure doesn't seem like a Clinton issue?
It was gonna be law either way; signing it removed a political weapon from the folks pushing its passage. Arguing this is something Clinton did to gay people is counterfactual.
Would you think it was okay if Tim Scott signed such a law just so his fellow Republicans couldn’t hold it against him in the primary? Well actually I wouldn’t be surprised if he did…
It's a pragmatic excuse.
Not signing changes nothing; clear statements that it's bad law; avoid giving the assholes pushing it more likelihood of winning the next election.
Am I suppose to be okay if he signed a law overturning “Brown vs Board of Education” because it would become law anyway?
Was the fact that he signed off on executing a mentally retarded man because it would show he was “tough on crime” just him being “pragmatic”?
https://jacobin.com/2016/11/bill-clinton-rickey-rector-death...
Getting back on topic, I don’t get to praise Chuck Norris because of his anti-racism stances but then dismiss his stances against non straight people.
Sure, but I think it's fair to praise people when they do good things, and criticize them for the bad that they do. That's true fir Chuck Norris, Bill Clinton, Barack Obama... anyone.
Totally agree, though, that it's bullshit to think that having positive views on some issues wipes away the bad.
Less than 1/3rd of eligible voters voted for Trump.
Not all people that voted for Trump consider themselves Republicans, much less MAGA, when MAGA is only 50-60% of Republicans.
So in reality less than 1/6th of the US voting-eligible population is MAGA. Not half.
And that was at the election - roughly 20% of Trump voters now openly profess regret in voting for him, though I don't think we have data breaking that down as self-proclaimed MAGA vs. otherwise. I suspect if you were not self-proclaimed MAGA you're more likely to be open to regret, but I'm sure at least some of them were MAGA.
Significantly less than half the country voted for Trump. This is objective fact.
Significantly less than 100% of Trump voters identify as MAGA. This is objective fact.
Approving of Trump as President is also not the same thing as being MAGA, though the overlap is quite likely reasonably high at this point.
You can make an argument that there are more MAGA people than I estimated, but the argument I was referring to was basing it all off of voters for the 2024 election. If you want to make a different argument, we can look at it on its merits.
If 40% of the country still supports everything that’s going on, that tells you a lot about this country. Especially seeing that because of the 2 Senators per state regardless of population, gerrymandering and to a lesser extent the electoral college, they have outsized influence on the government.
Exactly how can you approve of what Trump is doing and not be MAGA?
I'm not saying that makes them good people, I'm just saying I don't think it's the same thing as maga.
2 senators per state isn't really the issue, but the cap on the house is. The senate was built to be population independent, and the house was built specifically to be population dependent, where yes if you had more people you had more power. Then they... voted to cap it, because it was going to give too much power to states with more people. Dumb. EV also tied to the house, so uncapping it unfucks a lot of that, too.
To your other point, I’ve met some Bush/Romney type Republicans who hold their nose and voted for Trump because the Democrats did go to far on social issues and I say that as a Black guy.
When I was at BigTech in 2020 I thought all of the videos we had to watch on “micro aggressions”, continue announcements on “ally programs”, “Latinx” instead of Latino/Latina (that every single Latino person I spoke to thought was ridiculous), the “how do we feel” meetings about Floyd, and the kind of liberals I met when I flew out to Seattle and other west coast offices (I worked remotely the entire time) were just weird. Not to mention being chastised if you didn’t put your preferred pronouns under your name.
I was like can I just do my damn job?
The different chambers are supposed to represent different interests and instead we've made both halves of congress effectively the same thing.
There's deeper rot with the system besides these things - like the apparent lack of safeguards against the executive branch just... ignoring everything, including sometimes even the supreme court... but I don't think the framer's original intentions for the house and senate are fundamentally incorrect.
It is simply false that "half the country [voted] for Trump".
If I have 10 friends and ask them all where they want to eat for dinner and 6 said let’s go to this nice Italian spot and the other 4 said “let’s kill Ralph and eat him”, that still means I have a shitty friend group.
maga is absolutely something to be ashamed of
Can you explain why it's not something to be ashamed of?
Rampant abuse of the legal system to target individuals, despite claiming (without evidence) that that was that the Democrats did against them
Total disregard for the constitution
Threats towards the judiciary
A million other things that I can list - but I'm sure you've heard them all and just don't care, so there's probably not much use in me continuing.
America won’t be “great” until minorities, non Christians and non straight people know their role.
It absolutely has nothing to do with putting america first, it has everything to do with putting trump first. Im afraid you have made the mistake of listening to a politicians words instead of watching his actions. Every word from his mouth is a lie.
> To us living in the US maga stands for...
This is not true. The GOP won the popular vote, centrists see some advantages in MAGA, and even some Democrats are against MAGA without going to the extreme of painting them all as pedophiles and corrupt.
You are in the minority with that opinion.
Or more aptly, you're commenting on the title instead of reading TFA.
MAGA does not mean what you think it means for the people who actually live here.
Witness the abrupt reversal in public opinion on foreign wars in the last month.
He was a vocal proponent of the birther conspiracy theory about Obama
The homophobia? The racism? The infidelity? The conspiracy theories?
Or just because he was a martial artist and actor that had a bunch of low effort memes?
Terry Crews? Porn addict. [2]
Lin Manuel Miranda "blindly asks BIPOC performers to act in a piece detailing historical events benefiting their oppressors." [3]
Henry Cavill undermined the #MeToo movement saying he feared being called a "rapist" if he pursued women. [4]
John Cena buries talent... used his backstage influence to undermine the momentum of new stars (remember The Nexus in 2010, CM Punk etc) [5]
Steve Irwin fed a crocodille while holding his month-old son, putting him in danger. [6]
Dave Grohl? Chronic infidelity. [7]
All these men are way better than me, for sure. But you can see how these arguments against Chuck Norris are a slippery slope:
> The homophobia? The racism? The infidelity? The conspiracy theories?
You're cherry-picking virtues from people aligned with your politics and ignoring the good things your perceived "adversaries" have.
[1] https://www.npr.org/2020/04/30/847315345/officer-clemmons-mi...
[2] https://www.addictioncenter.com/community/terry-crews-pornog...
[3] https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2020/12/9/unpop-opinion-c...
[4] https://culturess.com/2018/07/13/henry-cavill-missed-point-m...
[5] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQr5ZD6fr0g&t=3s
[6] https://www.bbc.com/news/newsbeat-47343688
[7] https://www.gutinstinctmedia.com/latest-articles/a-rockstar-...
Steve Irwin I don't think what he did was a particularly big deal with the kid.
I don't really like celebrities as role models though. They have to have public personas as a matter of course. I would instead try to point to specific behaviors from real people. I also don't think people have to be perfect. But I do think there are some deal breakers that would mean I would never point my kids towards them as a role model. Racism and homophobia are among those things. I think believing that whole classifications of people are lesser is disqualifying.
Just like the parent comment was trying to do with Chuck Norris. (Which was probably way worse than any of these examples)
> Could you give a couple of examples of what you would consider > "good role models for well-adapted men" ?
I'm actually curious.
Supreme court judge, mother of 7, still finds time to go to the gym.
But maybe lets talk about how Amy got called out by The Human Rights Campaign and 185 LGBTQ organizations for her "disturbingly anti-LGBTQ past writings, rhetoric and association with extremist groups." [2]
Or how about when The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights described her record as "fundamentally cruel," arguing she frequently sides with corporations over individuals and shows hostility toward established precedents like the Affordable Care Act.
At least Chuck Norris had no real impact on policy with his bigotry.
[1] https://www.leeboyce.com/truth-the-fitness-life-is-a-relativ...
[2] https://www.hrc.org/press-releases/the-human-rights-campaign...
[3] https://civilrights.org/resource/oppose-the-confirmation-of-...
Sure, there are people that hate her. Her own patron, our Dear Leader, probably hates her when she rules against his interests. All the more reason to respect her.
Just out of curiosity, could you think of one man that could also be a role model for men and women?
Of course, "real men" can be just the opposite, depending on who you ask. So, it's really a subjective issue.
I don't think every man should be like that, but I also don't think any of those qualities are bad. In fact, I think they're pretty admirable.
Do you have issues with the fact that some men conform to that type?
Being able to provide for someone is an admirable quality, man or woman
Same for being able to protect someone.
I don't think being emotionally restrained is a good thing - and I say this as someone who was raised to be emotionally restrained. I've had to specifically work as an adult to be less emotionally restrained. I think there's a very wide gap between being emotionally restrained and letting emotions rule over you.
I'd reckon you'd be hard pressed to find a single person that matches every quality/belief you imagined them to have.
I have friends and family who I never thought had a hateful, cruel, or belligerent bone in their bodies, suddenly start acting like totally different people, in the span of a few years. This isn’t me holding them to some purity checklist!
Some of them taught me how to behave!? Did they just not believe any of those things?
MAGA is a horrifying movement.
And the monkey's paw curls…
nit: I wouldn't call it "mask off" though, as if it's been there the whole time. I'd say it's more like there is tiny a kernel of that (and let's be honest, who doesn't have this in some form or another?), combined with a lack of willpower and critical thinking, that causes them into give in to the siren song of easy answers from mass-personalized propaganda.
[0] ancap and religious fundamentalism are the only frameworks I've been able to find that fit the maggot movement, and they're not particularly constructive.
But some of those failings are forgivable, others are not.
Getting genuinely confused about pronouns sometimes: forgivable.
Being a loud, public MAGA homophobe transphobe: not forgivable.
Him liking Trump was a symptom of his regressive, homophobic, and racist beliefs.
BUT, I was in karate as a kid in the prime of his sponsorship of tournaments, and he was indeed a role model then. He was a good guy in that field, promoting martial arts and the discipline, fitness and respect that goes along with it. I can vouch that having him promote hard work, training and respect in martial arts at age 10 did not turn me into a Christian nationalist.
Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan were in a completely different league.
A lot of people spend most of their waking hours having to deal with or at least keep in mind the fall out from regressive politics. Asking people to not discuss politics is like asking someone living in fear for their safety to not try and improve said safety. You're asking to not have to be bothered by something that annoys you to talk about in exchange for someone not being able to advocate for their life and livelihood.
Somewhere along the way we lost that idea, not all cultural changes are for the better.