Quote:
Originally Posted by The_Dunedan
Pardon me, but I fail to see how the equivalency is false. Both sides have wealthy, powerful people (and Corporations, officially recognised as "Persons" under the law, in a display of collectivism that makes my teeth burn) moving behind the scenes.
True.
Both sets of those people/Persons use their frequently vast fortunes in order to purchase research, influence journalism and debate, and attempt to shape public perceptions of themselves and their opponents.
True.
Please point out the falsity in equivalence here. When both sides of an argument are doing essentially the same things (buying research), for the same reasons (to influence public opinion) towards the same ends (to maintain and increase their power, wealth, and influence) how can you say the equivalency is false?
Oh, right. One bunch buys research for the right, good, and noble causes...the other side are evil meanies who worship greed. Arsey-varsey, one side buys research for the right, good, and noble causes...the other side are evil meanies who worship Barack Obama. My mistake.
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Let's talk about apples and oranges.
They're the same, right?
Both grow on trees.
True.
Both are sold in juice form.
True.
Both are roughly fist-sized.
True.
Both are grown in the United States.
True.
So clearly, apples and oranges are equivalent. Because clearly situations and scenarios which have things in common are automatically equivalent. Please tell me you don't actually think this way.
Given the reaction to this thread, one might expect that if roachboy were to post a thread mildly critical of apples, some apple fanboys (or more accurately, people who associate themselves with the noble apple) would stumble in and complain about how oranges are just as bad as apples (because of course if roachboy is criticising apples, there's no way that he could ever be critical of anything associated with oranges), and that roachboy's criticisms of apples are invalid or not worthy of discussion because oranges are gross too and he neglected to point out that oranges are gross in his original post. Nevermind that we're talking about apples here, and not the rambling pewls of apple fanboys.
Are you lost? Because I'm lost too. I'm in a thread ostensibly about how a large oil and chemical company spent money in novel ways to manipulate public opinion in order to increase their profits, but what we seem to be talking about is how, since other organizations may or may not engage in similar nefarious acts, the original premise of the thread should be abandoned.