Multiheaded comments on How to Build a Community - Less Wrong

13 Post author: peter_hurford 15 May 2013 05:43AM

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Comment author: Multiheaded 16 May 2013 08:51:26PM *  1 point [-]

The culture there is -not- conducive to human rights; its next door neighbors are sentencing people to jail or death for the crime of apostasy.

Oh? Culture? I wonder what you'd say about German or Japanese "culture" circa 1945, and the historical trends of their respect for human rights. (Especially the treatment of different ethnic groups.)

Or, conversely, about Afghanistan in the 1960s. Certainly Afghanistan started out with more disadvantages than Saudi Arabia, and no oil wealth. Yet the cultural changes there were not rolled back even under the communist regime - the emancipation of women, rural education, etc went on like in other Soviet client states. It took the American-armed, American-sponsored fundamentalist thugs to turn the clock back to misery and domination.

Comment author: [deleted] 16 May 2013 09:43:03PM *  2 points [-]

I find OW's comparison of Chilean culture with that of its neighbors really perplexing, as Chile is vastly different from most of South America. For example, it's a massive outlier on the CPI map.

Comment author: Eugine_Nier 17 May 2013 01:49:14AM 3 points [-]

Do you know how this came to be? I could imagine a Pinochet supporter claiming credit for this.

Comment author: OrphanWilde 16 May 2013 09:47:00PM 4 points [-]

The culture comparison was between Dubai and its neighbors; I only brought Chile up because I figured I might as well go all-in on the "Supporting asshole dictators who I figure managed to do more good than bad" front.