Perception of Race and Political Ideology

A fascinating article, The neural basis of ideological differences in race categorization, examines if and how political ideology might influence perception and categorization of race by White liberals and White conservatives. Mixed Black-White images were used to elicit responses by Whites. The results hint at, or are consistent with, the possibility that there are differences in specific brain response activity (anterior insula) between liberals and conservatives. The insula plays a key role in processing emotional responses. The brain response was attributed mostly to racially ambiguous faces (racial ambiguity), and not to skin tone darkness and Afrocentric features (Black prototypicality). 

When people see racially ambiguous faces, there is an unconscious bias to categorize the face as belonging to a subordinate racial group, i.e., Black in this research. Other research found that this kind of discrimination (hypodescent categorization or discrimination) is more likely among conservatives than liberals. 

The researchers write:

Multiracial individuals are often categorized as members of their ‘socially subordinate’ racial group—a form of social discrimination termed hypodescent—with political conservatives more likely than liberals to show this bias. .... We found that conservatism was related to greater anterior insula activity to racially ambiguous faces, and this pattern of brain activation mediated conservatives’ use of hypodescent. This demonstrates that conservatives’ greater sensitivity to racial ambiguity (rather than Black prototypicality) gives rise to greater categorization of mixed-race individuals into the socially subordinate group and tentatively suggests that conservatives may differ from liberals in their affective reactions to mixed-race faces. .... White Americans’ use of hypodescent is often motivated by a desire to preserve the status quo racial hierarchy with Whites on top, and political conservatives tend to engage in hypodescendant categorization more strongly than liberals.

Whites perceive mixed Black-White faces in at least two different ways, on the basis of (i) prototypical features (skin tone and Afrocentric features), and (ii) racial ambiguity. The researchers used brain scan technology because standard behavioral research methods cannot disentangle how and why conservatives tend to categorize multiracial individuals as members of their most subordinate racial group more often than liberals.[1] 

Conclusion: One can see how complex and tentative this kind of research is. As usual, this work needs to be replicated and confirmed. To see how widespread and influential the differential race perception phenomenon is, the research needs to be expanded to include other mixed race images, e.g., Hispanic-White, Black-Asian, Asian-White, etc. If the results hold up, this knowledge can possibly shed some light on the biological source of one of the key issues that is tearing American society and politics apart, i.e., racial discrimination, racial bigotry and racism. 

It may be the case that the biological-cognitive source of conservative unease and its move toward authoritarianism can be slowed or stopped if the source of the fear can be understood and addressed. Conservative fear of the impending majority White to majority minority transition may be a significant driver of the social and political toxicity that is killing American democracy and social cohesion. If so, confirmation and more knowledge about the phenomenon could be very helpful to say the least.

Footnote:

1. For the science wonks in the crowd: The researchers comment that there are at least two possible explanations for the observed conservative vs liberal differences in race categorization. One is that conservatives have stronger tendency compared to liberals to categorize mixed-race faces as Black could be explained by sensitivity to increases in the Black prototypicality of mixed-race faces, and a desire to maintain a clear boundary around the conception or definition of Whiteness. 

The other is that conservatives might categorize mixed-race faces as Black because of a greater sensitivity to racial ambiguity.  Past research indicates that conservatives tend to show a stronger aversion to general ambiguity than liberals. Because of that, racial ambiguity might be particularly aversive to conservatives. The researchers write:

Political ideology has been associated anatomically with individual differences in insula grey matter volume and functionally to insula activity in response to political outgroup members, information about ingroup politicians, reactions to disgusting images and risky decisions. Furthermore, the anterior insula has been implicated in the learning of political allyship and White decisionmakers exhibit stronger insula activity when processing Black (versus White) faces.

In an article about this paper, the lead author, Amy R. Krosch (Cornell University), commented:

"We knew from our previous work that conservatives tend to categorize more mixed-race faces as their 'socially-subordinate' race, or according to hypodescent," Krosch said, "a principle closely related to notorious 'one-drop' rules, used to subjugate individuals with any nonwhite heritage by denying them full rights and liberties under the law from the earliest days of American slavery through the Civil Rights Era."  

Mixed-race faces vary on at least two critical dimensions, Krosch wrote: "Do conservative and liberals differ in their sensitivity to the racial content or racial ambiguity of such faces? Such questions are difficult to separate in behavioral investigations but might be critical to understanding the link between ideology and hypodescent."

 

March 4

 AS WE ALL KNOW BY NOW, DONALD TRUMP WILL BE INAUGURATED ON MARCH 4th, THIS YEAR.

READ ALL ABOUT IT!

https://disqus.com/home/discussion/snowflakes-forum/trump_to_be_inaugurated_as_president_march_4th/

But for those of us who would prefer to avoid the celebrations, what else is March 4th good for?

2021 Daily Holidays that fall on March 4, include:

• Benjamin Harrison Day 
• Brain Injury Awareness Day 
• Courageous Follower Day 
• Holy Experiment Day 
• Hug a GI Day
  
• International GM's Day - (GM = Game Masters)
• International Scrapbooking Industry Day 
• March Forth Do Something Day 
• Marching Music Day 
• National Backcountry Ski Day 
• National Dance the Waltz Day 
• National Grammar Day 
• National Hospitalist Day - March 4, 2021
• National Pound Cake Day 
• National Snack Day 
• National Sons Day
• Old Inauguration Day 
• Toy Soldier Day 
• World Book Day - March 4, 2021  - First Thursday in March (Primarily in United Kingdom and Ireland - most other Countries observe this day on April 23rd)
• World Hearing Day 

2021 Weekly Holidays that include March 4, are:

• British Pie Week - March 1-7 (Observed for 7 days starting on March 1st)
• Endometriosis Awareness Week - March 3-9, 2021
• Fairtrade Fortnight - February 22 - March 7, 2021
• Hearing Awareness Week - March 1-7
• Lent - February 17 - March 29, 2021
• Make Mine Chocolate - (Campaign kicks off annually on Feb 15, and ends on Easter which is April 4, 2021)
• National Aplastic Anemia & MDS Awareness Week - March 1-6
• National Cheerleading Week - March 1-7
• National Ghostwriters Week - March 1-7
• National Green Week - February 7 - April 30, 2021
• National Pasty Week - February 28 - March 6, 2021
• National Pet Sitters Week - March 1-7
• National Write a Letter of Appreciation Week - March 1-7
• Newspaper in Education Week - March 1-5, 2021 (First Full School Week in March)
• Read Across America Week - March 1-5, 2021 (M-F week of Dr. Seuss Birthday on March 2)
• Telecommuter Appreciation Week - March 1-7, 2021 (Week that includes Alexander Graham Bell's Birthday of 3/2)
• Universal Human Beings Week - March 1-7
• Will Eisner Week - March 1-7
• World Orphan Week - March 4-11

AS AN ADDED BONUS:

• 1952 - Ronald Reagan marries Nancy Davis
• 1960 - Lucille Ball files for divorce from Desi Arnaz

ALL THE GOOD NEWS HERE:

http://www.holidays-and-observances.com/march-4.html

 

The Ex-President's Accomplishments

Peek-a-boo: unintended consequences

Politico lists 30 things that happened during the last administration. Some of them are interesting and some are important. Some led to unintended consequences. Here are a couple of them.

Politico writes: 

Silver-loading

The move: House Republicans had tried for years to cut off subsidies that helped low-income Obamacare enrollees with the co-pays, co-insurance and deductibles that come with their health plans. In 2017, Trump finally did it through administrative means after the GOP effort to replace the law fell apart — and he immediately drew intense outcry from Democrats and policy experts who called the move “sabotage.”

The impact: The health exchanges didn’t collapse, as Trump had hoped. Instead, health plans and states quickly figured out a way to claw back the federal dollars they lost: They built the costs of the subsidies into premiums for Obamacare’s benchmark “silver” policies. This meant that premiums for these “silver” plans spiked and as a result, the premium subsidies the government had to pay for low-income enrollees vastly increased. The concept, known as “silver-loading,” grew government subsidizing of the exchanges by upwards of $20 billion per year.

The upshot: While Trump’s moves made Obamacare plans increasingly unaffordable for the unsubsidized, Democrats quickly tamped down their criticisms since it accomplished their goal of significantly boosting funding for Obamacare. The incoming Biden administration isn’t likely to reverse course.

Pandemic incompetence

The move: Despite pressure from Democrats, unions and worker advocates, OSHA refused to set rules for worker safety during the pandemic. Republicans defended the decision by saying the burden on companies struggling to stay afloat amid the recession would be too great. In the absence of a standard, employers have only had to comply with a mix of optional guidelines, able to pick and choose what precautions they take.

The impact: The agency’s backseat approach to workplace safety means Americans still face a dangerously unpredictable range of safety conditions when they show up to work. Though OSHA has cited some companies for coronavirus-related transgressions, many large corporations received meager fines even in cases where workers died from Covid-19. Democrats have attempted to include language mandating an emergency temporary standard in future rounds of pandemic aid — but their efforts have been unsuccessful.

The upshot: One of the first things a Biden administration will likely move to do is instruct OSHA to step up worker safety enforcement — including by enacting an emergency standard and ramping up penalties on violators. Biden’s campaign also pledged to double the number of OSHA investigators to enforce the law and existing standards.

Merging state tax dollars with the needy church

The move: DeVos tweaked a wide range of federal education policies, large and small, to bolster faith-based organizations. She changed regulations, for example, to make it easier for members of religious orders to access federal financial aid and expanded federal Public Service Loan Forgiveness to cover clergy members. And she created new protections for faith-based campus organizations at public universities.

At the K-12 education level, DeVos stopped enforcing a policy that had prohibited religious organizations from providing publicly funded services—such as tutoring, technology and counseling—in private schools. And she opened up federal grants for charter schools to religiously affiliated organizations.

The impact: Many religious education groups praised DeVos’ changes, which she often described as effort to expand religious liberty. “Too many misinterpret the ‘separation of church and state’ as an invitation for government to separate people from their faith,” she said.

The upshot: The Biden administration is expected to move quickly to roll back many of DeVos’ education policies, but it’s not yet clear how the incoming administration will approach her various policy tweaks to promote religious organizations.

Shining a light on the creatures hiding in shell companies

The move: Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin personally negotiated the anti-money laundering safeguards with Republicans and Democrats who crafted the deal. The new law would require millions of business entities to report their true owners, puncturing the veil of anonymity that shell companies give to money launderers and tax evaders and making it easier for prosecutors to literally follow the money.

The impact: The information businesses report to the Treasury Department would be accessible to law enforcement agencies that would have an unprecedented tool to investigate shell companies. Banks, which are responsible for policing criminal activity by their customers, would also be able to tap into the database.

The upshot: Criminals will keep finding ways to operate in the shadows. But the new disclosure rules could give law enforcement leverage over their frontmen and may make it harder for bad guys to find lawyers willing to help hide their money because of the new paper trail.

The anti-money laundering law was targeted mainly at terrorists and drug dealers, but it will probably have the unintended consequence of being able to track regular tax cheating rich business people who just hate taxes. This could blow back on people like the ex-president who tries as hard as he can to hide as much as he can. It is reasonable to think that the democrats drafted the law broadly while talking about terrorists and drug dealers, but also wanting to get at crooked business people. This could be a case where conservative ideology blinded the republicans to the true reach of the law they co-drafted with democrats. If that hypothesis is correct, the unintended consequences here are highly beneficial for everyone except people trying to hide their money, some of whom have good reason to hide and some don't.

Politico also reported on impacts on (1) food stamps where about 755,000 Americans lost access to food aid (food stamps), (2) student loans where loan forgiveness for schools that defraud students is now significantly harder to prove, and (3) toxic chemical regulation, which was reduced probably allowing less protection of the public against toxic chemical exposure. 

Differences of Opinion in the Democratic Party

An interesting assessment by FiveThirtyEight, Democrats Are Split Over How Much The Party And American Democracy Itself Are In Danger, finds three different mindsets about the current political situation. The first group sees a "Democratic and democratic emergency", the second sees a possible emergency, but just do popular stuff, while the third group sees no problem and wants to keep the filibuster and pass legislation on a bipartisan basis.

My assessment of the three groups is that there are two groups, the first two are basically close variants of each other, while the third is truly different. The second group, which includes Stacey Abrams, Rep. James Clyburn, Barack Obama and Bernie Sanders, is interesting. It wants to get rid of the filibuster so that legislation to protect voting rights can be passed. IMO, when voting rights in a democracy are under the severe attack the fascist GOP is now fully engaged in, democracy is in an emergency situation. Getting rid of voting rights to rig elections for the GOP is how the American experiment can come to an end and be replaced by fascism or some other form of far right authoritarianism.

FiveThirtyEight writes:

We're in an emergency

Ideas: Persuade Justice Stephen Breyer to retire as soon as possible and quickly confirm his replacement; get rid of the filibuster; with the filibuster out of the way, pass structural reform legislation, such as an updated Voting Rights Act, a raft of electoral reforms (H.R. 1), statehood for Washington, D.C., and an expansion of the Supreme Court by adding four new justices, as well as creating additional judgeships at the lower court levels.

The people in this camp don’t agree on everything, but they foresee a nightmarish (and fairly plausible) scenario for Democrats, and they’re proposing a series of steps to avoid that calamity. Here’s the Democratic nightmare: Biden and congressional Democrats pass a few major bills over the next two years but leave the filibuster in place, preventing the passage of major reforms to America’s electoral system. A federal judiciary stacked with Trump appointees strikes down all or parts of many of the laws the Democrats do pass as well as many of Biden’s executive actions, leaving Democrats few permanent policy victories and driving down the president’s approval ratings.

Meanwhile, Republicans use their control of most state legislatures to draw state legislative and U.S. House district lines in ways that are even more favorable to the GOP than the current ones and enact laws that make it harder for liberal-leaning voting blocs to cast ballots. Combine gerrymandering, voting limitations, lackluster poll numbers for Biden and the historic trend of voters rejecting the party of the incumbent president in a midterm election, and it results in the Republicans winning control of the House and the Senate and making even more gains at the state legislative level in November 2022.

Maybe we're in an emergency

Ideas: Get rid of the filibuster to pass popular legislation such as a new Voting Rights Act (H.R. 1), expanded background checks on gun purchases and an increased minimum wage.

The people in this group generally aren’t as alarmist as the this-is-an-emergency camp. They aren’t arguing that American democracy and the Democratic Party are at risk. And thus, this group generally isn’t pushing the most aggressive reform ideas, such as adding justices to the Supreme Court.

But they are pushing for some democratic reforms — in particular, getting rid of the filibuster. I included a number of major Black politicians in this camp because they tend to focus on getting rid of the filibuster as a means of passing laws that protect voting rights. From this camp’s point of view, an updated Voting Rights Act is a moral imperative, regardless of its electoral impact, and the filibuster must go if it stands in the way. When Obama referred to the filibuster as a “Jim Crow relic” in his speech last year at Rep. John Lewis’s funeral, he shifted the discourse in the Democratic Party on the filibuster, in my view, by casting it as a barrier to racial justice, a powerful message in an increasingly “woke” party.  

This camp is thinking electorally too, though. For people in this camp, getting rid of the filibuster is a path to passing a bunch of provisions that are popular with the public, such as making it easier to vote and increasing the minimum wage. Getting those kinds of bills passed, in this camp’s view, would help Democrats win in 2022 and 2024. So one reason this group is not likely to push for adding seats to the Supreme Court, even if the filibuster is gone, is that adding justices isn’t that popular an idea. In fact, there is talk in liberal circles about carving out exceptions to the filibuster for voting rights bills instead of completely gutting it. That approach might appeal to this bloc in particular.

Nah, there's no emergency

Ideas: Keep the filibuster in place and get more legislation passed on a bipartisan basis.

Democrats would need every Democratic senator on board to get rid of the filibuster, so these members are super-important. And over the last few months, Manchin and Sinema have said they are strongly opposed to getting rid of the filibuster. Longtime senators like Feinstein have hinted in the past that they are wary of such a move too.

Part of this opposition to getting rid of the filibuster reflects ideological differences — Manchin in particular is more conservative than most (if not all) congressional Democrats. So he probably isn’t dying to get rid of the filibuster to vote for a $15 federal minimum wage, for example, because it’s not clear he favors that idea anyway.

But this bloc also disagrees with the this-is-an-emergency camp about the state of American politics right now. Feinstein is fairly liberal on policy issues. But she, like Manchin and Sinema, has suggested she wants to work in a Senate that is not hyperpartisan and seems to believe that is possible. In the view of people in this camp, the Republican Party is not completely dominated by an anti-democratic wing that won’t work with Democrats. So members in this camp view getting rid of the filibuster and other more aggressive moves as not only unnecessary but potentially really bad — making the Senate and Washington overall even more gridlocked and polarized than they already are.

In view of the last ~30 years of American politics, the third group seems to be the most delusional about the situation. The GOP really is dominated by an anti-democratic wing that won’t work with Democrats. Republican political leaders and activists openly call the democrats and the press anti-American communists who are enemies of the people. That some democratic politicians cannot see that reality probably reflects an anti-democratic, pro-authoritarian streak in their mindsets and/or some mental weakness. The evidence of fascist GOP intransigence is overwhelming. So is the evidence that most congressional republicans buy into the lie that the 2020 election was corrupt and that the 1/6 coup attempt was something they could rationalize into acceptance. That leaves the ex-president an acceptable candidate if he chooses to run again in 2024 despite his dominant role in fomenting the coup attempt.

The Cuomo Situation…

 

Sexual harassment is the kind of thing men and women see differently.  While men may see their overly zealous flirtations as rather innocent, hopeful of a reciprocated response, or maybe even a sexual fantasy come true, women may see such flirtations as an attempt to dominate, intimidate, or insult.  It’s all a matter of sexual perspective. One usually knows when a flirtation is welcomed.  Without some sort of flirtation, no one would ever get together with/find a mate.  So I can get that part.

I have never been sexually abused, but I have been sexually approached in a way that was not welcomed by me.  I finally spoke up one day, and it stopped.  Luckily for the man, that was back in 1980, when such behavior flew under the radar more than it does today.  Today, women are no longer so tolerant.  I know I sure wouldn’t let it stand.  I’m not that young, gullible girl (often the victim) anymore. 😉

In a statement from Cuomo, he attempts to apologize.  It looks rather “boiler plate” to me, but…

"I now understand that my interactions may have been insensitive or too personal and that some of my comments, given my position, made others feel in ways I never intended. I acknowledge some of the things I have said have been misinterpreted as an unwanted flirtation. To the extent anyone felt that way, I am truly sorry about that."

Here is the question:

Should Cuomo step down, be removed, be ignored, be tolerated, other?

What, in your opinion, is the remedy to the Cuomo situation?

Judging Lies

Every politician lies. 

This fundamental truth is one of the few things all political commentators agree on. Lying is commonplace, tactful, and even sometimes considered the right thing to do. It is a tool of deception that even those deceived will occasionally respect, while voters will use the dishonestly as a cudgel against the party they dislike, rarely considering the dishonesty of their own allegiances. 

But just because everyone lies, does that make everyone equally a liar? Would a person who lies once be the same as a person who pathologically lies? Would a stance reliant on dishonesty equal a stance that does not, but who’s presentation was lied about to put it forward? 

This question has long vexed me, not because I do not have a ready answer, but because it is hard to explain to others why it is not really even a close question for me anymore when I look at political positions. For me it is clear, through scale, goal, context, prevalence and role, who earns the title “liar” and who is only occasionally dishonest. But how?

Let’s take a look at the five categories mentioned and maybe someone in the comments can distill it into a much more concise reasoning.

Scale

Simply put, there is lying about what you said at a party, and there is lying about embezzling 30 million dollars from sick children. The scale of the lie matters in judgement, because while you are being dishonest about your own words in the former, you are harming many people in the latter. Dishonesty on the personal scale simply doesn’t stack up to dishonesty on the societal scale. So when a politician is known for fibbing about themselves versus fibbing about the impact of their policies on others, it matters.

President Clinton lied about having an affair. It was a personal scale, between him, his wife and his affair partner. It’s complicated by it also being from a position of power, but it is otherwise inconsequential to the nation as a whole. 

President Trump lied about the impact of the Coronavirus. Hundreds of thousands of people died whom scientists have shown would not have if they were given the truthful information and the government had acted accordingly. 

Goal

Why lie? Are you lying because you understand that many people will twist the truth and that will undercut your program, or are you lying because the actual truth stands fundamentally against your goals? Neither are good, but a lie meant to protect the truth is better than a lie meant to attack the truth.

For example, Vice President Al Gore presented climate change’s worst possible outcomes and progress in an effort to get people to pay attention to this vital issue. He plausibly knew that they weren’t the most likely outcomes, but also knew that presenting the facts directly would often cause people to dismiss it, given their lack of knowledge over what a few degrees change would actually do. The goal was to get people to acknowledge the truth that climate change was a serious issue.

On the other hand we have Senator Jim Inhofe, who brought a snowball into Congress to argue that since there was snow, there was no climate change impact. It was meant entirely to derail any discussion of impact of climate change by noting that there was still snow, so it couldn’t (in his mind) be all that bad. It was an attempt to hide the truth, to attack it, by presenting something that didn’t even honestly address the premise.  

Context

Context can make a statement true or untrue, even if the intent or even the actual claim a person made was the opposite. 15 people being shot out of a population of 20 is a serious problem that needs immediate attention; 15 people out of 20,000,000 somewhat less. Someone claiming it is a problem is telling the truth, but context can make that claim more or less potent. 

For example, President Obama made a claim that under his ACA, no one would lose access to the doctor of their choice. It turned out that after the legislation was processed and altered, insurance companies refused to go along with many parts of it and thus this was not the case for many people. Additionally, many plans did not meet up with the (even then) standards for being a legal insurance, and so more people “lost” their plans. While Obama intended the truth, in context he was found to be lying, or oversimplifying, and so people found his statement to be dishonest.

On the other side we have President Trump claiming to have won the election in every state, on every level, with unprecedented voter fraud being the only reason he lost by 8 million votes. To protect this lie, he built a narrative that states illegally changed their voting process (they did not), that millions of people voted illegally (they did not), that dozens of voting count locations engaged in illegal activity (they did not) and that a recount would prove him right (it did not). While the context was also disproved, those who continue to support him cite the context he fabricated as something that turns an obviously dishonest claim into the truth. 

Prevalence

How often someone lies speaks to their credibility, or the chance you will believe something they say without full verification. Since no one has time to check every claim uttered, credibility matters to any honest conversation. Thus those who lie only a few times tend to have more, despite being dishonest sometimes, than one who is known to lie, or be hypocritical. 

As a Senator, President Joe Biden pushed against the hypothetical appointment of a Supreme Court Justice four months from Election Day, stating that consideration should wait until after the election. Specifically he stated that during an election season one should not be considered, but one could be made directly after the election, still within the term of the current president. He encouraged the parties to work together to find consensus candidates, and reject volatile candidates such as Robert Bork, who was widely considered the next up. As Vice President, Biden supported Obama’s selection of Merrick Garland for SCJ a year before election day, though the primaries were already well under way. This was considered by some to be hypocritical to his 1992 speech. 

One of his critics, Mitch McConnell, called it the “Biden rule” despite there being no such rule or precedent and despite it going against the text of the Constitution, and abdicated his duty to consider ANY nominee from President Obama for a year. He then turned around and confirmed a nominee for SCJ while voting in the general election was ongoing, not four years later. The hypocrisy not once but twice (McConnell supported any nominee in 1992 no matter the timeline) makes his dishonesty far more egregious.

Role 

Are lies meant to support a policy, or do they form the core of it? If your policy is meant to help people gain economic support, you may lie about some funding for it that makes it more palatable. However, you also have situations in which you tell people your policy is for economic support, while any analysis of it shows that to be at best a by-product. The role of your lie matters.

Elizabeth Warren was asked multiple times how she was going to pay for her policies helping education, childcare, social support and healthcare. She often would deflect any question of “would you increase taxes?” This was often done as a tactic to deny a soundbite, but it made her come off as dishonest because everyone knew that yes, taxes would go up, despite the personal cost to individuals going far done (less copays, side costs, etc). She omitted the truth to simplify the narrative.

The Republican Party pushed through a massive Tax Cut package in 2017, billed as a way to help the economically disadvantaged. Analysis of the bill have proven that to be both fallacious in intent and effect, as supply side economics has been widely disproved, most of the relief went to the top 1% of wealth owners, and much of the lower relief was set to end in 2020, while the upper relief was not. The core of the bill was a lie; this was not meant to help the economically advantaged, it was meant to reduce restrictions and tax burdens on the wealthy. 

Summary

We have to make decisions as voters, and that decision requires judgement of policy, of impact and of integrity. To me it is very obvious where the most failures are in the latter, which is why I vote the way I do. I hope this look into the five noted aspects illuminates a process I believe most people judge by, and that it takes away this idea of everyone being equal if they lie even once. We cannot continue to make decisions on such wildly inaccurate generalizations. 

Truth matters. Who you hurt by attacking the truth matters. Why you lie matters. How much you directly harm that truth matters. How often you lie matters. And how you use lies matters. 

I wonder how much it matters to you?