Opinion: Virtue signaling is good because virtue is good and expressing your concept of virtue in a public way can serve as a persuasive tactic to convince others to adopt it
since there aren't any non-material things the attempt to be assigned merit for non-material things is obviously a scam and should be treated as such i'd argue that the idea that you can have virtues that don't cost you anything is opposite to what virtue is supposed to be
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If you must reduce everything to crude materialism, then everything costs you time and energy, which is an opportunity cost. This means that any act that you take onhere is by default of material value. Also, the issue of virtue being a function of sacrifice is highly debatable.
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oh no, crude materialism. we only like assigning attributes & agency to spooky unobservable entities, which is very refined if you're trumpeting a virtue, which you expect to be rewarded since people do reward it, that cost you nothing, you aren't virtuous, you're a rent-seeker
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There are multiple "virtues" I "trumpet" knowing full well that doing so means a lot of shitty conversations with people who think those virtues are bad. I'm not saying this to boost my ego. I'm saying this because I think your second paragraph is based on bad assumptions.
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if you reasonably expect to be significantly punished for promoting what you hold to be virtuous, and do it anyway, congratulations, you're paying a cost that provides meaningful if not conclusive evidence that your convictions are genuine
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My point is that this should be generally assumed for most people willing to take a stand online, not that I am uniquely better than most.
End of conversation
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that isn't entirely true because you do see people fighting over the amount of time and energy they spend volunteering or protesting or what-have-you, which is virtue signal authentication, but close