Comment on Gary Stevenson: 'Tax wealth or we'll return to the feudal age'
gtrcoi@programming.dev 3 weeks agoYou’re framing of that video is complete rubbish. The hosts repeatedly state that they agree there are problems with economic equality, and accurately describe the problem at every point. Their point isn’t about the stats, it’s about how Gary is a grifter that tailors his message to attract simpletons who like shiney words and empty rhetoric. That he can’t even engage with a chart that might support his message because actual data isn’t a part of the equation for him, only rhetoric and whatever cherry picked headlines he can find to support it.
You’re also just framing this as a gotcha for the same reasons, that Gary is constantly playing victim, so his fans carry that message as well. He wasn’t a victim, he’s a grown ass man that can’t handle any push back without crying like a little bitch.
You complain about a graph not being enough to draw a conclusion then point to an even worse data point that completely misses 49.999% of the population in its analysis. That’s some turbo charged populist brainrot, and Gary will definitely add it to his grab bag of factoids to dazzle his audience for year to come, like jingling keys in front of babies.
hark@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
Those two hosts agree there are problems with economic inequality, so then what’s the point of the graph? Is the graph showing there isn’t an inequality problem? If so, doesn’t that mean the hosts themselves are dismissing the graph?
gtrcoi@programming.dev 2 weeks ago
hark@lemmy.world 2 weeks ago
You claim it’s not about stats and yet their issue is that he didn’t want to get dragged into a pointless argument over the minutia of some chart. If these hosts agree that wealth inequality is a problem, then it’s an established point that doesn’t need to be rehashed through arguments over a chart. Gary knows this, his audience knows this, the hosts know this, and we know this, and many are living through this. What purpose does arguing over a chart do other than to try to distract from the message? If you want a strong message that resonates with people, you have to keep it simple and straightforward.
Whether he’s a grifter or not is a matter of opinion. Dismissing his message by calling him a grifter is a textbook example of ad hominem. His message is simple:
What is your issue with these key points? That he hasn’t spent enough time in the chart mines? That you think he’s a grifter? Clearly his method of communication has been effective in drawing attention on the issue while offering a solution and I think that’s a great thing.
gtrcoi@programming.dev 2 weeks ago
It’s great for Gary because the 4th bullet point you forgot to add is “involve Gary in economic policy making cause he’s so smart and the academics in their ivory tower are all useless”. He sounds just like the Eric Weinstein complaining that the Trump admin didn’t call the intellectual darkweb for help.
Everything is downstream from that with these people, because they rely on simplifications of complex issues to dupe laymen into thinking they are the only ones with the answers.
Here is a OECD paper looking at the pros and cons of a wealth tax oecd.org/…/the-role-and-design-of-net-wealth-taxe… it won’t go viral because it isn’t written by slopulist clout goblins like Gary. I doubt he’s read it because it contains a LOT of graphs, but that’s just the kind of thing you need if you’re going to start advocating for tax reform. Showing a graph or two might have helped him if this article is to be believed.
Gary is a flashy spiv with boring, half-baked ideas and he will never provide information in this much detail. He needs to keep it simple for the clicks, inevitably pushing his audience up mount stupid so they can walk into the ballot box with confidence and vote for economic arsonists with shiney slogans like his. People like Nigel Farage who also benefit from Gary’s bipartisan message of broken institutions and elite corruption.