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When will the liberals learn? Silencing only fuels this movement. Silencing is the path of least intellectual integrity. Don't they realize that every time they
by Kenji 10y ago
When will the liberals learn? Silencing only fuels this movement. Silencing is the path of least intellectual integrity. Don't they realize that every time they ban or block the alt-right, instead of refuting their arguments, the alt-right wins? People aren't that stupid, you can't just block the alt-right talking points out of their sight and thus out of their mind. Same thing with 'fake news'. The notion of 'hate speech' has been used so broadly that it is now inflated to complete meaninglessness.
- michaelmrose 10y agoStudies have shown that arguing with extremists makes them more resolute. Also not doing business with them isn't silencing them they are just as free to pursue their mission tomorrow as today.
- CydeWeys 10y agoThe embargo on South Africa in protest of apartheid worked. I don't see why something similar wouldn't work here. Breitbart is first and foremost a business, and they have lots of employees on staff pushing these messages of hate that need to be paid. If their income stream dries up it makes it much harder to continue doing what they're doing.
- gspetr 10y agoSmall sample might be at fault here. For a counterexample: has the embargo on Iran worked?
- Kenji 10y agoStudies have shown that if you call someone you disagree with an extremist, fruitful conversation is extremely unlikely to happen.
- tobltobs 10y agoNot wasting customers marketing budgets == Silencing ?
- matthewmacleod 10y agoI do appreciate what you mean by this, and I'm sure most people would agree that recently we've seen particularly abject failures of the left wrt. engaging with these issues. But I'm not convinced that there is an 'argument' to 'refute'. We're not talking about a coherent disagreement between well-informed parties. In fact, some groups seem to actively embrace ignorance – see Michael Gove's 'people have had enough of experts' nonsense.
- rconti 10y agoRefuting arguments doesn't work when the source of the mistruth is either too stupid to understand truth, willfully shuns the truth, or is simply drowned out by their own echo chamber.
- Fluid_Mechanics 10y agoYou must be a very clever man to be ranting about your insecurities on a technology website.