Does it actually matter whose ancestors colonized first? What's the difference between Hawaii's colonization by ethnic Tahitians and North America's colonization by ethnic English?
It's interesting that "Hawaiian" has a different meaning on the islands, and that people might not say "Hawaiian shirt" there just like people don't say "French bread" in France. However, pointing out supposed insensitivity to ethnic groups is pretty much the main hobbyhorse of moralizing busybodies the world over in 2018, and unlikely to win you much affection. It's got to the point where the phrase "the n-word" strikes one as unseemly, and we'll start saying "the word that starts with the letter that comes after 'M'".
As an aside, those you refer to as "indigenous Polynesian people" are actually a later wave of Tahitian colonists who conquered and oppressed the previous settlers from the Marquesas Islands.
That's a fine distinction, but what word would you use to describe something that's a product of Hawaii but not ethically Polynesian? Like Hawaiian pineapples, or loco moco? On the islands you could just call it "local" but on the mainland that wouldn't make any sense.
> high taxes, inane regulations, petty nanny-state authoritarianism, tolerance for rising lawlessness and disorder on its streets in the name of "compassion"
I would focus on patterns for remote collaboration (structured and searchable chat, VR hangouts) combined with old-fashioned face time (monthly or quarterly in-person activities).
A portable personal Internet server that runs as a turnkey no-user-maintenance image on AWS, Digital Ocean, and OpenStack. It hosts your email, federated social networking and chat, file sharing and ad-blocking web proxy. The user experience is pure Internet with no ads, surveillance or vendor lock-in, all for $6/mo (hosting + DNS).
Good point on reading multiple viewpoints. As for fiction, there are a few writers who say true and interesting things about the world but they don't write Star Wars novels. I'd say "Disgrace" by Coetzee and "Demons" by Dostoevsky are examples.
You're free to say "Fuck this, I don't want to argue anymore" if you like. The mistake is believing that makes anyone still talking a "harrasser" in the legally actionable sense.
> fundamentally recursion is syntactical sugar over loops and stacks, as assembly can show you.
That's one possible implementation of recursion on commodity hardware. Recursion itself is a mathematical method for defining a function which may not even be computable, or may be computable using other primitives.
> My only contention was that it was valid for someone to feel harassed because someone said they deserve less because of their sexuality.
Ok. I agree people's feelings are valid. I believe if someone feels harassed because of my opinion, my opinions may be just as valid as their feeling of harassment, and society is better served by open discussion than sparing feelings at all costs.
I realize that some people may abuse this to hurt other's feelings without making a sincere and salient point, which is regrettable. I'd like to think all my points can be articulated without offending anyone, though that's probably unrealistic.
I appreciate that you respect the 1st Amendment. It's a common Blue trope that the 1st Amendment doesn't apply to speech involving supposed racism or sexism (which they refer to as "hate speech").
I don't think that's well-defined enough to unilaterally shut down debate. What if my religion tells me I can't work 6 months out of the year, and I need the same job protection Christians get for not working on Christmas and Easter? What if I'm asexual and I'm denied the tax benefits married people get? You're saying not only are these claims automatically granted, but that just discussing them is a punishable offense.
Also why is "religion, race, gender or sexuality" the holy quartet? Why not ageism, ablism, lookism, or my rights as a short person? Why are those open to debate while the others aren't?
> I do not think you can make an argument against gay marriage which treats all sexualities equally, by very definition.
How can I reasonably be expected share my argument, if by your own criteria I'll be guilty of harassment if you disagree?
That's the stifling effect of "disagreement is harassment".
Think about it. By your criteria, discussion can't even happen if anyone's rights are at stake. Yet any meaningful disagreement will involve someone's rights - what is the extent of a right, and under what conditions can it be circumscribed. All of this talk is now off limits.
Maybe you should try to make sure you can win these arguments instead of preemptively banning them.
PS: I'm really not interested in gay marriage. As I said it's just an example of suppressing debate. Compare to how Red evangelicals will invite atheists to publicly debate evolution, which I think is more constructive. I can give more examples of Blue debate-silencing through harassment claims but this seems sufficient illustrative.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discovery_and_settlement_of_Ha...
Does it actually matter whose ancestors colonized first? What's the difference between Hawaii's colonization by ethnic Tahitians and North America's colonization by ethnic English?