Open Thread 23 - 29 Oct | 54 comments (54 topical, editorial, 0 hidden)

Re: Open Thread 23 - 29 Oct (none / 1)

By the way, isn't "virtue signaling" a recent term?

'Virtue-signalling' -- the putdown that has passed its sell-by date

As the Boston Globe columnist Mark Peters has pointed out, "virtue-signalling" has existed in isolated pockets since at least 2004, but was popularised (not, as he claims, invented) by James Bartholomew in the Spectator in April 2015. If you've heard the phrase recently, it's most likely being used according to his definition [...]
"Virtue-signalling" is also a neat, pithy phrase, with - and this is the killer, really - a social-sciencey air, as though it's a phenomenon recorded by behavioural economists and factored into nudge-unit projections of how many men pee standing up. (As of January 2016, however, a Google scholar search for the term yields only a handful of citations related to the work of a single religious studies academic.)

by das monde on Sat Nov 4th, 2017 at 06:58:07 AM EST
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Re: Open Thread 23 - 29 Oct (none / 0)

When I was feeling particularly saucy @ calculatedrisk, I'd lede some new file thus:

NEW SCRIPT! PLACES, EVERYONE

Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

by Cat on Sat Nov 4th, 2017 at 06:16:38 PM EST
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Re: Open Thread 23 - 29 Oct (none / 1)

It is pithy, but is really a recycled version of 'blowing your own horn', or 'whitening the sepulchre' so nothing new.
I expect the next meme phrase description to get parsed will be 'self-referential'.
Because 'raving egomaniac' is so yesterday.
Or'Fake News' as 'bald-faced lies' aka 'McWhoppers'.

'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty

by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Sat Nov 4th, 2017 at 07:51:20 PM EST
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Re: Open Thread 23 - 29 Oct (4.00 / 2)

`Virtue Signaling' Isn't the Problem. Not Believing One Another Is.

The real problem, of course, isn't the signaling part: Everyone is signaling all the time, whether it's about social justice or their commitment to Second Amendment rights or their concerns about immigration law. Those who accuse others of virtue signaling seem angry about the supposed virtues themselves -- angry that someone, anyone, appears to care about something they do not. Another Twitter user, defending Donald Trump after the infamous "Access Hollywood" tape, wrote: "Stop virtue signaling. It doesn't work. Are you saying you never talked dirty in a [private] conversation?" The logic here is not that Trump or his actions were morally correct, but that no one else is, either, and anyone who claims otherwise is lying.
Those who cry "virtue signaling," though? At least, they claim, they're honest about it. They are, of course, trying to signal something about their own values: that they are pragmatic, appropriately cynical, in touch with the painful facts of everyday life. Virtue signaling can be a way of staking out a position in an argument -- not just the high ground, but the highest ground. (You may be against racism, but I am more against racism than you.) But calling out virtue signaling is a useful position in itself.

Hillary Clinton was an easy target for this charge, nevertheless.

by das monde on Sun Nov 5th, 2017 at 01:03:50 AM EST
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Open Thread 23 - 29 Oct | 54 comments (54 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)