Meinung | Poilievres Erzählung vom „gesunden Menschenverstand“ ist „aufgewärmter konservativer Kaffee“
https://www.thestar.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/poilievre-s-common-sense-narrative-is-reheated-conservative-coffee/article_978ffa8a-81ae-11ef-b90e-cfc406505824.html
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Common sense rhetoric is terrible for politics. It is the equivalent of taking complex socioeconomic or biological phenomena and eviscerating all nuance and complexity from the issue.
Common sense applies to things basic courtesy, survival and safety (i.e., don’t walk in front of traffic, don’t assault people, don’t touch the hot thing, et cetera). However, we have conservatives applying “common sense” to vaccinations and other medical procedures as if the common person is equipped to come to informed and learned opinions on these issues all by themselves. What you end up with is a bunch of intellectually vulnerable people forming opinions based off a superficial and cursory glance at an issue who feel their gut feelings (common sense) are enough for them to participate in public discourse. It’s just another way to get people ***not*** to think about things too hard and react as impulsively as possible.
Common sense is an amazing slogan. To use the tired but classic quote: half of all people have below average intelligence.
These people are ignorant to their stance on this scale and a term like “common sense” resonates because they believe it is them who holds this common sense while others (dem libs!) don’t. Similar sentiment to “street smarts over book smarts” PP is the Sheppard of the street smart while the “left” represent the book smarts.
A lot of people are hurting and feel disenfranchised right now. It’s easy for them to see themselves as street smarts and the libs (who at times have a smug outlook) to be the book smart that got them into a mess due to over analyzing everything while common sense, they understand, its so simple that the smarmy libs couldn’t see.
Other examples parroted are “supply and demand” “axe the tax” “facts over feelings”(despite the irony of this slogan) these sound bite slogans ring true to these people, there’s elegance in the simplicity to the common sense Canadian while the remainder are trapped analyzing the nuance of each situation.
Short story long, I feel like we’re living in the 2012 movie *The Campaign*
“You better get a broom, cause it’s a mess”
“Common sense” would say to pour water on a grease fire, ’cause everyone knows that’s how you put out fires.
“Common sense” says that the Monty Hall Problem gives you 50-50 odds after a door has been eliminated.
“Common sense” says to steer in the direction you want to go when your vehicle is sliding the wrong way.
I don’t trust common sense anywhere near something as complex and interconnected as governance.