6 ms·

That is not bullying, it is you taking offense to pixels. Which you are perfectly free to do, but nobody is bullying you by putting their art online.

by sooheon 10y ago

spike021 10y ago
That's why I separated the kind of bullying it is. Maybe I didn't explain my thought-process very well, but the idea is it may have not been directed specifically to bully, but by making statements, like "you're taking offense to pixels", there is an unintentional/passive form of bullying going on. It gives off the feeling of "well not everybody feels this way so it's just you and you shouldn't really be feeling this anymore or at all". Not everybody can just shut off feelings like that or desensitize themselves from a symbol. Plain and simple. It's just not that easy. IMO bullying can also make someone feel uncomfortable; not necessarily in a threatening sense, but in a way where the person just doesn't feel right, like they don't fit in properly- the bullying makes them stand out and not in a 'good' way.
- sooheon 10y ago
  Somebody who does not even know you exist, puts up a drawing which they have no idea whether you will see or not, for their own purposes which you have no way of knowing, and you happen to come across it and feel bad. I think it's not fair to the word "bullying" to use it in this context. There's a point where the word is no longer appropriate--I think "passive" bullying is an oxymoron. A bully is someone who targets someone else, and makes that person feel bad by repeatedly abusing them verbally and physically. This is a very bad thing, which is why the word is powerful, but it's very different from words like "offensive", which is more in line with what you mean. You are made uncomfortable by it, the poster likely has no intention whatsoever toward you.
  - shuntress 10y ago
    The symbols, especially in this particular context, are put up as representations of the communities (and their ideals) that put them there. What community does the swastika represent and what are their ideals? The 'passive' bullying is done by displaying the symbol in a public space to 'bully' those who recognize it as a message that they are not welcome and not wanted in that space.
    - cyphar 10y ago
      Out of interest, what is your opinion about jokes related to Nazis? Are skits that have a swastika in them bad because they have a swastika in them? If someone says something that is clearly a white supremacist ideal, but doesn't use a swastika, does that make their message any less bad? From my experience "symbol X is offensive" doesn't actually help distinguish between malicious and non-malicious people because the thing that makes someone malicious is their actions and views, not the iconography they use to express said actions and views.
      - shuntress 10y ago
        >From my experience "symbol X is offensive" doesn't actually help distinguish between malicious and non-malicious people because the thing that makes someone malicious is their actions and views, not the iconography they use to express said actions and views. I completely agree with this. I think most content creators make a conscious effort to make their intent known through the work. For Example, movies like "Inglourious Basterds" or "Downfall" are clearly using Nazi iconography to build the aesthetic of their world without suggesting they support the ideals of the real-world Nazis. Perhaps a more poignant current example is youtube personality JonTron. The basic gist as I understand it is: He occasionally makes off-color or insensitive jokes that could easily be considered offensive but are generally regarded as OK because the intent is understood to be a place of comedy. Now after defending some racist remarks, his past statements are seen in a new light that makes their original intent less clear. I do think it's something important to discuss and we clearly can't have a discussion if what we want to talk about is a banned taboo. But I also think it's clearly wrong to treat any hate-speech/iconography as if somehow doesn't have all that extra cultural baggage.
        cyphar 10y ago
        > Perhaps a more poignant current example is youtube personality JonTron. [...] I think it's at the very least disingenuous to claim that his recent remarks are racist (the more we use that word, the more watered down it becomes). And it's also sad that people assume that your politics cannot change either. My reading of the situation is that he was just doing a thought-experiment and asking why multiculturalism is only an issue in the western world. It's true that he appears to be more right-leaning than other people in the skeptic "community" but that view is not racist. It's just a question. When he went on to "debate" someone else, it's quite clear that he hasn't debated this topic before and it's quite clear that he probably hasn't heard any of the counter-arguments to his points before (because he hasn't argued them before). Would he change his mind if he had heard those counter arguments? Would he refine his opinions? Maybe, but calling him a racist doesn't help anyone. I would've assumed people learned that with all of the recent political events (Brexit, Trump, everything that's happening in Europe), they'd realise that calling everyone a misogynist/racist/Nazi doesn't actually help... > But I also think it's clearly wrong to treat any hate-speech/iconography as if somehow doesn't have all that extra cultural baggage. Right, but "cultural baggage" doesn't appear to me to be a justification for wanting such things banned or not allowed. I find some of 4chan's trolling distasteful and I probably wouldn't have done what they did, but I would never say they shouldn't be allowed to do what they do (not the least of all because I find some of their trolling quite funny).
lifeformed 10y ago
Why is it so important to accommodate trolls and nazis? If a stranger in my house at a party drew a swastika on my wall, I'm kicking him out. If someone on my website did the same, I would also remove him. It's not me getting offended, it's just curation of the community. If someone doesn't want to follow the social norms of the community they're in, fine, but they'll pay the consequences. They can form their own community if they want.
- pbhjpbhj 10y ago
  >If a stranger in my house at a party drew a swastika on my wall, I'm kicking him out. // So you say "draw what you like on the walls" and then punish a follow of Vishnu because you associate the symbol differently to them. Don't invite strangers to draw stuff on your walls then? >If someone doesn't want to follow the social norms of the community they're in // Such as free speech. Don't give people freedom of speech and then chastise them for speaking freely. If they act immorally, or unethically, or illegally, sure ... but don't punish people for art alone.
  - lifeformed 10y ago
    Context is important. Communication is as much about interpretation as intent. If you draw a swastika in an environment where a swastika represents nazis, without taking the care to establish the context in which you would not be misrepresented, then sorry, I'm erasing it. 99.999% of the time an unadorned swastika is drawn anonymously in public in a Western environment, it's not the religious kind. So save it for a situation where the meaning is clear. I didn't give anyone freedom of speech. If someone calls me racial slurs in my house, I'm kicking them out. Freedom of speech is for the courts, not for curating the communities I want to be in.
    - pbhjpbhj 10y ago
      >99.999% of the time an unadorned swastika is drawn anonymously in public in a Western environment, it's not the religious kind. Ok, so drawing it is an act of rebellion that tells us something about people, in a piece of public, open, collaborative art that's a good thing. I want to hear opposing views to my own, if someone sincerely rallies behind a swastika/flag/emblem i want to see, learn why, not usher them away. Reddit has much more abhorrent content than a simple emblem. You're of course right, you don't have to give free speech. But it helps to do so occasionally especially when the medium prevents any actual harm coming from it.

That is not bullying, it is you taking offense to pixels. Which you are perfectly free to do, but nobody is bullying you by putting their art online.

by sooheon 10y ago

That is not bullying, it is you taking offense to pixels. Which you are perfectly free to do, but nobody is bullying you by putting their art online.

spike021 10y ago

That's why I separated the kind of bullying it is. Maybe I didn't explain my thought-process very well, but the idea is it may have not been directed specifically to bully, but by making statements, like "you're taking offense to pixels", there is an unintentional/passive form of bullying going on. It gives off the feeling of "well not everybody feels this way so it's just you and you shouldn't really be feeling this anymore or at all". Not everybody can just shut off feelings like that or desensitize themselves from a symbol. Plain and simple. It's just not that easy. IMO bullying can also make someone feel uncomfortable; not necessarily in a threatening sense, but in a way where the person just doesn't feel right, like they don't fit in properly- the bullying makes them stand out and not in a 'good' way.

sooheon 10y ago
Somebody who does not even know you exist, puts up a drawing which they have no idea whether you will see or not, for their own purposes which you have no way of knowing, and you happen to come across it and feel bad. I think it's not fair to the word "bullying" to use it in this context. There's a point where the word is no longer appropriate--I think "passive" bullying is an oxymoron. A bully is someone who targets someone else, and makes that person feel bad by repeatedly abusing them verbally and physically. This is a very bad thing, which is why the word is powerful, but it's very different from words like "offensive", which is more in line with what you mean. You are made uncomfortable by it, the poster likely has no intention whatsoever toward you.
- shuntress 10y ago
  The symbols, especially in this particular context, are put up as representations of the communities (and their ideals) that put them there. What community does the swastika represent and what are their ideals? The 'passive' bullying is done by displaying the symbol in a public space to 'bully' those who recognize it as a message that they are not welcome and not wanted in that space.
  - cyphar 10y ago
    Out of interest, what is your opinion about jokes related to Nazis? Are skits that have a swastika in them bad because they have a swastika in them? If someone says something that is clearly a white supremacist ideal, but doesn't use a swastika, does that make their message any less bad? From my experience "symbol X is offensive" doesn't actually help distinguish between malicious and non-malicious people because the thing that makes someone malicious is their actions and views, not the iconography they use to express said actions and views.
    - shuntress 10y ago
      >From my experience "symbol X is offensive" doesn't actually help distinguish between malicious and non-malicious people because the thing that makes someone malicious is their actions and views, not the iconography they use to express said actions and views. I completely agree with this. I think most content creators make a conscious effort to make their intent known through the work. For Example, movies like "Inglourious Basterds" or "Downfall" are clearly using Nazi iconography to build the aesthetic of their world without suggesting they support the ideals of the real-world Nazis. Perhaps a more poignant current example is youtube personality JonTron. The basic gist as I understand it is: He occasionally makes off-color or insensitive jokes that could easily be considered offensive but are generally regarded as OK because the intent is understood to be a place of comedy. Now after defending some racist remarks, his past statements are seen in a new light that makes their original intent less clear. I do think it's something important to discuss and we clearly can't have a discussion if what we want to talk about is a banned taboo. But I also think it's clearly wrong to treat any hate-speech/iconography as if somehow doesn't have all that extra cultural baggage.
      - cyphar 10y ago
        > Perhaps a more poignant current example is youtube personality JonTron. [...] I think it's at the very least disingenuous to claim that his recent remarks are racist (the more we use that word, the more watered down it becomes). And it's also sad that people assume that your politics cannot change either. My reading of the situation is that he was just doing a thought-experiment and asking why multiculturalism is only an issue in the western world. It's true that he appears to be more right-leaning than other people in the skeptic "community" but that view is not racist. It's just a question. When he went on to "debate" someone else, it's quite clear that he hasn't debated this topic before and it's quite clear that he probably hasn't heard any of the counter-arguments to his points before (because he hasn't argued them before). Would he change his mind if he had heard those counter arguments? Would he refine his opinions? Maybe, but calling him a racist doesn't help anyone. I would've assumed people learned that with all of the recent political events (Brexit, Trump, everything that's happening in Europe), they'd realise that calling everyone a misogynist/racist/Nazi doesn't actually help... > But I also think it's clearly wrong to treat any hate-speech/iconography as if somehow doesn't have all that extra cultural baggage. Right, but "cultural baggage" doesn't appear to me to be a justification for wanting such things banned or not allowed. I find some of 4chan's trolling distasteful and I probably wouldn't have done what they did, but I would never say they shouldn't be allowed to do what they do (not the least of all because I find some of their trolling quite funny).

lifeformed 10y ago

Why is it so important to accommodate trolls and nazis? If a stranger in my house at a party drew a swastika on my wall, I'm kicking him out. If someone on my website did the same, I would also remove him. It's not me getting offended, it's just curation of the community. If someone doesn't want to follow the social norms of the community they're in, fine, but they'll pay the consequences. They can form their own community if they want.

pbhjpbhj 10y ago
>If a stranger in my house at a party drew a swastika on my wall, I'm kicking him out. // So you say "draw what you like on the walls" and then punish a follow of Vishnu because you associate the symbol differently to them. Don't invite strangers to draw stuff on your walls then? >If someone doesn't want to follow the social norms of the community they're in // Such as free speech. Don't give people freedom of speech and then chastise them for speaking freely. If they act immorally, or unethically, or illegally, sure ... but don't punish people for art alone.
- lifeformed 10y ago
  Context is important. Communication is as much about interpretation as intent. If you draw a swastika in an environment where a swastika represents nazis, without taking the care to establish the context in which you would not be misrepresented, then sorry, I'm erasing it. 99.999% of the time an unadorned swastika is drawn anonymously in public in a Western environment, it's not the religious kind. So save it for a situation where the meaning is clear. I didn't give anyone freedom of speech. If someone calls me racial slurs in my house, I'm kicking them out. Freedom of speech is for the courts, not for curating the communities I want to be in.
  - pbhjpbhj 10y ago
    >99.999% of the time an unadorned swastika is drawn anonymously in public in a Western environment, it's not the religious kind. Ok, so drawing it is an act of rebellion that tells us something about people, in a piece of public, open, collaborative art that's a good thing. I want to hear opposing views to my own, if someone sincerely rallies behind a swastika/flag/emblem i want to see, learn why, not usher them away. Reddit has much more abhorrent content than a simple emblem. You're of course right, you don't have to give free speech. But it helps to do so occasionally especially when the medium prevents any actual harm coming from it.