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^^^ The parent comment hits the ball out of the park. The commentary on past posts on HN and elsewhere floors me. It seems one or two things are prevalent: 1

^^^ The parent comment hits the ball out of the park. The commentary on past posts on HN and elsewhere floors me. It seems one or two things are prevalent: 1. Folks will gladly loan the hangman the rope that he will use to hang you, your family, and your neighbors — all because of "purity of belief" in free speech. Sorry, hate to break it to you, but these illiberal forces are a clear and present danger to this comfortable society you call home. 2. Support for Cryptofascism (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crypto-fascism https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crypto-fascism) is rampant. Either folks don't know that they already support it, or they wittingly do and are too afraid to say it out in the open. Immensely disturbing. As someone who cherishes the rule of law over the rule of man, not aiding and these illiberal parties is the minimum. They are not pluralists; they don't care about the rules of the game. They won't politely tolerate you. Deviants will be chastised, expelled/expatriated, jailed, or killed. Ignoring prudence (preservation of self and the society at-large) is perilous.

aaron-lebo 9y ago
Get out of here with the crying wolf. Sorry, hate to break it to you, but these illiberal forces are a clear and present danger to this comfortable society you call home. No, it's the last gasps of a dying breed of racists, empowered by the Internet and that look a lot more popular than they are due to media focus. Nazis are lame, but you leave them alone and there's nothing to fuel the fire. You send out counterprotesters, get in fights with them, act like these people are on the verge of starting a civil war and in their minds you've proved them right (delusional though they may be), and they get energized and then you have a real problem. Kicking nazis off the Internet is one thing, but yours (and the grandparent) is the language that causes the slippery slope arguments. That people can't even discuss the issue of free speech without being assumed to be nazi sympathizers or "cryptofascists" or whatever we want to label people we don't agree with isn't ok. Someone having a debate about the right of nazis to use modern services is not by extension a nazi.
- steve_musk 9y ago
  "No, it's the last gasps of a dying breed of racists, empowered by the Internet and that look a lot more popular than they are due to media focus." Really? Because yesterday the PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES defended white nationalists and neo-nazis on national TV. This discussion also shouldn't have much to do with free speech. If private companies do not want to allow pro-nazi websites to use their servers, they should be allowed to refuse them. The only slippery slope here is the idea that Nazis are dying and there is no need to take them seriously. People in Germany did not take them seriously when Hitler started his rise to power, then the country fell into disarray and Hitler had simple answers to hard questions. After everything that has happened over the past year, it is time to stop thinking that something like Hitler's rise to power could never happen again. We are in uncharted waters.
  - aaron-lebo 9y ago
    There are more dangerous things in life than nazis, like bad drivers, and well-meaning but ignorant people with power. You are more likely to have been killed by Islamic terrorism than nazism in the US over the last couple decades (going back to OKC at least). Trump is unscrupulous, he'd defend anyone who would be his friend (and there aren't many of those these days, so he's left with the dregs). He's not a slick political maneuverer who is going to overturn the federal government. He'll be gone in a few years. The displays like this last weekend are hundreds or a couple thousand people. They aren't parades of uniformed militia (like Hitler's rise saw). These people want attention. They're getting it especially when we exaggerate the threat they pose, which only fuels their grandiosity and recruitment.
    - cm2187 9y ago
      From what I understood Trump is rather refusing to pick side, which is a bit different. And less shocking than outright supporting neo-nazis. And I tend to agree personally. If a bunch of far-right thugs gets to fight with a bunch of far-left thugs, why should I have to pick a side? I support neither.
    - sdoering 9y ago
      So in the end what you are proposing is some kind of media ban? Some kind of censorship? Not to have someone report on these things? I try to understand your strategy. Because this does not seem to be a valid workable way imho.
chvid 9y ago
I don't have any sympathy for the Daily Stormer. I just don't see where this is stopping. What else needs to be taken down? /pol/? Who about Breitbart? Or maybe some 2nd WW Nazi propaganda? Or something from the US civil war? You guys seem to be ok with this very slippery slope being assessed by random private companies accountable to who knows. And then you have the nerve to call us who believes that limits of free speech should be set by courts and open process "nazis"?!
- Akujin 9y ago
  If Breitbart or /pol/ are hosting discussions in the open between known Nazis or people who are advocating to take terrorist actions and they do not moderate and delete these things then yea they actually should be shut down. We would not tolerate this from Al Qaeda or with child porn so I really don't understand the problem. Nazism has caused orders of magnitude more suffering in the history of man than either of the previous things I mentioned.
  - troisx 9y ago
    Well communism caused even more suffering, so should we shut down every communist site as well?
    - jononor 9y ago
      And christian sites? Christianity caused much suffering, christening whole nations by the sword, the crusades etc.
      - coldtea 9y ago
        Not to mention colonialism, imperialism and corporatism.
    - croon 9y ago
      > If Breitbart or /pol/ are hosting discussions [...] advocating to take terrorist actions and they do not moderate [...] they actually should be shut down. > [...] shut down every communist site as well? And you completely disregarded the conditions why?
fennecfoxen 9y ago
> They won't politely tolerate you. Deviants will be chastised, expelled/expatriated, jailed, or killed. If they have the power to? Yeah, in a heartbeat. But they're not the only ones, or the most powerful ones, just the most ostentatiously intolerant. > 1. Folks will gladly loan the hangman the rope that he will use to hang you, your family, and your neighbors — all because of "purity of belief" in free speech. If both Nazis and (as an example) Communists have free speech, then I can be supremely confident that I have free speech, and that I can use it without being expelled, jailed, or killed. (Chastisement, well, as long as you mean the verbal kind, I'll just have to cope.) I sure as Hell don't defend their rights because I like them. Have you never actually felt your ability to speak out meaningfully threatened by the society around you?
- Akujin 9y ago
  All it takes is a few key fascists in government positions to tear all of this down. All it takes is one false flag terrorist attack to justify the systematic persecution of a group of people. This is what happened in Germany. Recently in Turkey. And it can happen here just as easily.
  - aaron-lebo 9y ago
    If you know your history, you know that liberal democracies have more enemies than fascists (particularly of the hick nazi variety).
- contrast 9y ago
  A white supremacist killed someone at the weekend for protesting. If their free speech gives you supreme confidence, then you are simply wrong. The evidence is fresh. You will have free speech - as long as you only go to the right places, say the right things, wear the right clothes, have the right colour skin. Over time, supremacist movements reduce that free space in greater and greater amounts. This is what the evidence of history tells us, very clearly. We can see it happening now. If despite the hard evidence that these groups are opposed to free speech and willing to kill those exercising it, you still defend their right to try and subjugate or kill people merely because of their DNA, you are not defending free speech. What you're really doing is celebrating your own virtue - you're defending their rights because you like yourself. You are taking a calculated risk with other people's lives to do so. Even if they're not even trying to speak at all, but just walking down the street while being the wrong race/gender/religion/etc. Fundamentalist free speech advocates make an implicit assumption: that a race of billions of social animals can completely avoid situations where one group makes another even feeling uncomfortable. It's purist nonsense. Occasionally feeling you aren't entirely free to speak is part of being a social animal. Part of living is learning when keeping your trap shut means you're being oppressed or censored, and when you are just being respectful to someone else's house, or a workplace, or suffering beyond your experience. You can't use a civilised person's inevitable experience of "well, I didn't want to cause offense" to justify Nazis.
lsd5you 9y ago
I always wondered why we didn't see the term crypto-fascism come up more in the last few years. Perhaps because it is too honest and gives room for manoeuvre (although equally it is going to be hard to disprove). Hence people shouting 'Nazi' - which reminds me of kids calling the cops in the UK 'The Feds' - both of which sound idiotic. We had the terms we needed (Neo-Nazi and Crypto-Fascist) and they both meant something. I would say we also need to introduce a counterpart. e.g. crypto-stalinist or crypto-communist. As it is an equally plausible accusation to make that some people with hidden beliefs on that side of the spectrum could take them to those dark places.
adekok 9y ago
> As someone who cherishes the rule of law over the rule of man, not aiding and these illiberal parties is the minimum. That's good. But the rule of law should apply over "not aiding" those people. In the private sector, there have been a number of cases where companies (a) don't apply their ToS to people they agree with, and (b) over-apply their ToS to people they disagree with. See Vidcon && Sargon for the most recent example. i.e. When given the choice, the groups that value "inclusiveness" and "tolerance" and "due process" violate all of that...
- gasof 9y ago
  Safe spaces and diversity are diametrical to due process and tolerance. You're assumed guilty and treated as lesser if "privileged", which means white, male or both.
  - gasof 9y ago
    Do you find my statement idiotic, badly reasoned, unproductive or just "wrong"? I'd love to know, seriously.
EJTH 9y ago
> They won't politely tolerate you. Deviants will be chastised, expelled/expatriated, jailed, or killed. Ignoring prudence (preservation of self and the society at-large) is perilous. Except I never really seen a 'neonazi' saying "punch a communist" I never seen mass media encourage such behavior either. Do you not realize that this is cyclic reinforcement of behavior? (Antifa says punch nazis, nazis punch back, antifa ups their game with HIV needles and guns, nazis up their game etc) Both sides are disgusting, but the fact that the media covers up for the leftist violence makes me stand on the side of the so called "right wing extremists".
- danenania 9y ago
  Just calling yourself a Nazi or doing the chants or whatever carries with it an implicit provocation and threat of violence toward minority groups. Responding with actual violence in turn is not the right approach, but when we see large armed mobs forming and declaring themselves pro-genocide, it's absurd to call the people protesting them the 'real problem'.
- lentil_soup 9y ago
  why do you need to "take sides"? life is not binary. If you don't like antifa that's fine, but you don't then need to support nazis for that ...
  - NoGravitas 9y ago
    If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality. - Desmond Tutu We must take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented. - Elie Wiesel
    - beaconstudios 9y ago
      I'm not sure that argument holds water when it's 2 groups of violent political agitators going up against each other. The fundamental question is whether you think the communists in this situation are good guys, or if their ideology is just as harmful as that of Nazis. The body count would seem to indicate the latter even if it sounds better in theory.
Houshalter 9y ago
>Folks will gladly loan the hangman the rope that he will use to hang you, your family, and your neighbors — all because of "purity of belief" in free speech. Sorry, hate to break it to you, but these illiberal forces are a clear and present danger to this comfortable society you call home. Replace like 3 words in your comment, and I could make it into a rant advocating persecution of Communists. Which has happened before in the US. But it's ok now because it's against your political enemies? Second, no they are not. They are a tiny tiny percentage of the population. They have been losing power and numbers for decades. They get little representation in the mainstream and in the media. When they speak up with their beliefs or attend a protest unmasked, they often lose their jobs. They are not even remotely a serious threat. Just like communists during the Red Scare.
- thehardsphere 9y ago
  >Replace like 3 words in your comment, and I could make it into a rant advocating persecution of Communists. Which has happened before in the US. But it's ok now because it's against your political enemies? If by "it's against your political enemies" means "it's against people who want to overthrow your society and replace it with a repressive one" then the two cases are exactly the same in principle and only differ in details. So yeah, I'd say that they're both OK, under the exact same logic.
  - jononor 9y ago
    You are aware that opinions on what constitutes 'repressive' and not varies?
    - thehardsphere 9y ago
      It's not a matter of opinion that the goal of communists is to overthrow every existing social institution. Marx explicitly states it in The Communist Manifesto. Given that the United States is a free country where most of the social institutions have formed through voluntary free association, it also follows that overthrowing those institutions would require ending people's voluntary support of them. Because most people have no reason to end their support of social institutions voluntarily, this eventually requires instituting a repressive society. Thus, it is not a matter of opinion that communism would create a repressive society within the American context. Nor is it a matter of opinion that Nazis would seek to do the same; I hope I don't need to outline that for you.
discopicante 9y ago
I recommending watching 'The People vs. Larry Flynt' for a (much-needed) lesson in what Freedom of Speech means in the United States. I am certain Larry Flynt had a hard time finding print houses willing to publish Hustler but the fact he was being arrested and prosecuted – by the government – for distributing Hustler is when/where the line was crossed. I have doubts that SCOTUS will ever consider 'The Nazis vs. Cloudflare'.
JohnStrange 9y ago
I've got to agree. I was quite shocked by some of the comments on earlier threads about this topic. For example, someone suggested that the German Nazi party was advocating mild socialist reforms very similar to modern social democrats, entirely ignoring "minor details" like that the SA actively beat up people on the streets and spread terror wherever they showed up, that the nazis attempted a Coup d'Etat, and that socialists and communists later went to prison and concentration camps for their political views. Not to speak of killing 5-6 million Jews and being responsible for the death of about 25 million soldiers and 55 million civilians in WW2... The largest cognitive dissonance is with those people who suggest that jihadist propaganda should be interrupted but Nazi propaganda should be allowed to thrive unconditionally. That sounds very crazy to anyone who knows a little bit about history and can compare orders of magnitudes.
matttproud 9y ago
This has already has a name, and the eminent Karl Popper describes its precepts better than I: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance.
z0r 9y ago
An atmosphere of free speech that allows for satire and conversation are the best weapons against extremist ideology.

aaron-lebo 9y ago

Get out of here with the crying wolf. Sorry, hate to break it to you, but these illiberal forces are a clear and present danger to this comfortable society you call home. No, it's the last gasps of a dying breed of racists, empowered by the Internet and that look a lot more popular than they are due to media focus. Nazis are lame, but you leave them alone and there's nothing to fuel the fire. You send out counterprotesters, get in fights with them, act like these people are on the verge of starting a civil war and in their minds you've proved them right (delusional though they may be), and they get energized and then you have a real problem. Kicking nazis off the Internet is one thing, but yours (and the grandparent) is the language that causes the slippery slope arguments. That people can't even discuss the issue of free speech without being assumed to be nazi sympathizers or "cryptofascists" or whatever we want to label people we don't agree with isn't ok. Someone having a debate about the right of nazis to use modern services is not by extension a nazi.

steve_musk 9y ago
"No, it's the last gasps of a dying breed of racists, empowered by the Internet and that look a lot more popular than they are due to media focus." Really? Because yesterday the PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES defended white nationalists and neo-nazis on national TV. This discussion also shouldn't have much to do with free speech. If private companies do not want to allow pro-nazi websites to use their servers, they should be allowed to refuse them. The only slippery slope here is the idea that Nazis are dying and there is no need to take them seriously. People in Germany did not take them seriously when Hitler started his rise to power, then the country fell into disarray and Hitler had simple answers to hard questions. After everything that has happened over the past year, it is time to stop thinking that something like Hitler's rise to power could never happen again. We are in uncharted waters.
- aaron-lebo 9y ago
  There are more dangerous things in life than nazis, like bad drivers, and well-meaning but ignorant people with power. You are more likely to have been killed by Islamic terrorism than nazism in the US over the last couple decades (going back to OKC at least). Trump is unscrupulous, he'd defend anyone who would be his friend (and there aren't many of those these days, so he's left with the dregs). He's not a slick political maneuverer who is going to overturn the federal government. He'll be gone in a few years. The displays like this last weekend are hundreds or a couple thousand people. They aren't parades of uniformed militia (like Hitler's rise saw). These people want attention. They're getting it especially when we exaggerate the threat they pose, which only fuels their grandiosity and recruitment.
  - cm2187 9y ago
    From what I understood Trump is rather refusing to pick side, which is a bit different. And less shocking than outright supporting neo-nazis. And I tend to agree personally. If a bunch of far-right thugs gets to fight with a bunch of far-left thugs, why should I have to pick a side? I support neither.
  - sdoering 9y ago
    So in the end what you are proposing is some kind of media ban? Some kind of censorship? Not to have someone report on these things? I try to understand your strategy. Because this does not seem to be a valid workable way imho.

chvid 9y ago

I don't have any sympathy for the Daily Stormer. I just don't see where this is stopping. What else needs to be taken down? /pol/? Who about Breitbart? Or maybe some 2nd WW Nazi propaganda? Or something from the US civil war? You guys seem to be ok with this very slippery slope being assessed by random private companies accountable to who knows. And then you have the nerve to call us who believes that limits of free speech should be set by courts and open process "nazis"?!

Akujin 9y ago
If Breitbart or /pol/ are hosting discussions in the open between known Nazis or people who are advocating to take terrorist actions and they do not moderate and delete these things then yea they actually should be shut down. We would not tolerate this from Al Qaeda or with child porn so I really don't understand the problem. Nazism has caused orders of magnitude more suffering in the history of man than either of the previous things I mentioned.
- troisx 9y ago
  Well communism caused even more suffering, so should we shut down every communist site as well?
  - jononor 9y ago
    And christian sites? Christianity caused much suffering, christening whole nations by the sword, the crusades etc.
    - coldtea 9y ago
      Not to mention colonialism, imperialism and corporatism.
  - croon 9y ago
    > If Breitbart or /pol/ are hosting discussions [...] advocating to take terrorist actions and they do not moderate [...] they actually should be shut down. > [...] shut down every communist site as well? And you completely disregarded the conditions why?

fennecfoxen 9y ago

> They won't politely tolerate you. Deviants will be chastised, expelled/expatriated, jailed, or killed. If they have the power to? Yeah, in a heartbeat. But they're not the only ones, or the most powerful ones, just the most ostentatiously intolerant. > 1. Folks will gladly loan the hangman the rope that he will use to hang you, your family, and your neighbors — all because of "purity of belief" in free speech. If both Nazis and (as an example) Communists have free speech, then I can be supremely confident that I have free speech, and that I can use it without being expelled, jailed, or killed. (Chastisement, well, as long as you mean the verbal kind, I'll just have to cope.) I sure as Hell don't defend their rights because I like them. Have you never actually felt your ability to speak out meaningfully threatened by the society around you?

Akujin 9y ago
All it takes is a few key fascists in government positions to tear all of this down. All it takes is one false flag terrorist attack to justify the systematic persecution of a group of people. This is what happened in Germany. Recently in Turkey. And it can happen here just as easily.
- aaron-lebo 9y ago
  If you know your history, you know that liberal democracies have more enemies than fascists (particularly of the hick nazi variety).
contrast 9y ago
A white supremacist killed someone at the weekend for protesting. If their free speech gives you supreme confidence, then you are simply wrong. The evidence is fresh. You will have free speech - as long as you only go to the right places, say the right things, wear the right clothes, have the right colour skin. Over time, supremacist movements reduce that free space in greater and greater amounts. This is what the evidence of history tells us, very clearly. We can see it happening now. If despite the hard evidence that these groups are opposed to free speech and willing to kill those exercising it, you still defend their right to try and subjugate or kill people merely because of their DNA, you are not defending free speech. What you're really doing is celebrating your own virtue - you're defending their rights because you like yourself. You are taking a calculated risk with other people's lives to do so. Even if they're not even trying to speak at all, but just walking down the street while being the wrong race/gender/religion/etc. Fundamentalist free speech advocates make an implicit assumption: that a race of billions of social animals can completely avoid situations where one group makes another even feeling uncomfortable. It's purist nonsense. Occasionally feeling you aren't entirely free to speak is part of being a social animal. Part of living is learning when keeping your trap shut means you're being oppressed or censored, and when you are just being respectful to someone else's house, or a workplace, or suffering beyond your experience. You can't use a civilised person's inevitable experience of "well, I didn't want to cause offense" to justify Nazis.

lsd5you 9y ago

I always wondered why we didn't see the term crypto-fascism come up more in the last few years. Perhaps because it is too honest and gives room for manoeuvre (although equally it is going to be hard to disprove). Hence people shouting 'Nazi' - which reminds me of kids calling the cops in the UK 'The Feds' - both of which sound idiotic. We had the terms we needed (Neo-Nazi and Crypto-Fascist) and they both meant something. I would say we also need to introduce a counterpart. e.g. crypto-stalinist or crypto-communist. As it is an equally plausible accusation to make that some people with hidden beliefs on that side of the spectrum could take them to those dark places.

adekok 9y ago

> As someone who cherishes the rule of law over the rule of man, not aiding and these illiberal parties is the minimum. That's good. But the rule of law should apply over "not aiding" those people. In the private sector, there have been a number of cases where companies (a) don't apply their ToS to people they agree with, and (b) over-apply their ToS to people they disagree with. See Vidcon && Sargon for the most recent example. i.e. When given the choice, the groups that value "inclusiveness" and "tolerance" and "due process" violate all of that...

gasof 9y ago
Safe spaces and diversity are diametrical to due process and tolerance. You're assumed guilty and treated as lesser if "privileged", which means white, male or both.
- gasof 9y ago
  Do you find my statement idiotic, badly reasoned, unproductive or just "wrong"? I'd love to know, seriously.

EJTH 9y ago

> They won't politely tolerate you. Deviants will be chastised, expelled/expatriated, jailed, or killed. Ignoring prudence (preservation of self and the society at-large) is perilous. Except I never really seen a 'neonazi' saying "punch a communist" I never seen mass media encourage such behavior either. Do you not realize that this is cyclic reinforcement of behavior? (Antifa says punch nazis, nazis punch back, antifa ups their game with HIV needles and guns, nazis up their game etc) Both sides are disgusting, but the fact that the media covers up for the leftist violence makes me stand on the side of the so called "right wing extremists".

danenania 9y ago
Just calling yourself a Nazi or doing the chants or whatever carries with it an implicit provocation and threat of violence toward minority groups. Responding with actual violence in turn is not the right approach, but when we see large armed mobs forming and declaring themselves pro-genocide, it's absurd to call the people protesting them the 'real problem'.
lentil_soup 9y ago
why do you need to "take sides"? life is not binary. If you don't like antifa that's fine, but you don't then need to support nazis for that ...
- NoGravitas 9y ago
  If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality. - Desmond Tutu We must take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented. - Elie Wiesel
  - beaconstudios 9y ago
    I'm not sure that argument holds water when it's 2 groups of violent political agitators going up against each other. The fundamental question is whether you think the communists in this situation are good guys, or if their ideology is just as harmful as that of Nazis. The body count would seem to indicate the latter even if it sounds better in theory.

Houshalter 9y ago

>Folks will gladly loan the hangman the rope that he will use to hang you, your family, and your neighbors — all because of "purity of belief" in free speech. Sorry, hate to break it to you, but these illiberal forces are a clear and present danger to this comfortable society you call home. Replace like 3 words in your comment, and I could make it into a rant advocating persecution of Communists. Which has happened before in the US. But it's ok now because it's against your political enemies? Second, no they are not. They are a tiny tiny percentage of the population. They have been losing power and numbers for decades. They get little representation in the mainstream and in the media. When they speak up with their beliefs or attend a protest unmasked, they often lose their jobs. They are not even remotely a serious threat. Just like communists during the Red Scare.

thehardsphere 9y ago
>Replace like 3 words in your comment, and I could make it into a rant advocating persecution of Communists. Which has happened before in the US. But it's ok now because it's against your political enemies? If by "it's against your political enemies" means "it's against people who want to overthrow your society and replace it with a repressive one" then the two cases are exactly the same in principle and only differ in details. So yeah, I'd say that they're both OK, under the exact same logic.
- jononor 9y ago
  You are aware that opinions on what constitutes 'repressive' and not varies?
  - thehardsphere 9y ago
    It's not a matter of opinion that the goal of communists is to overthrow every existing social institution. Marx explicitly states it in The Communist Manifesto. Given that the United States is a free country where most of the social institutions have formed through voluntary free association, it also follows that overthrowing those institutions would require ending people's voluntary support of them. Because most people have no reason to end their support of social institutions voluntarily, this eventually requires instituting a repressive society. Thus, it is not a matter of opinion that communism would create a repressive society within the American context. Nor is it a matter of opinion that Nazis would seek to do the same; I hope I don't need to outline that for you.

discopicante 9y ago

I recommending watching 'The People vs. Larry Flynt' for a (much-needed) lesson in what Freedom of Speech means in the United States. I am certain Larry Flynt had a hard time finding print houses willing to publish Hustler but the fact he was being arrested and prosecuted – by the government – for distributing Hustler is when/where the line was crossed. I have doubts that SCOTUS will ever consider 'The Nazis vs. Cloudflare'.

JohnStrange 9y ago

I've got to agree. I was quite shocked by some of the comments on earlier threads about this topic. For example, someone suggested that the German Nazi party was advocating mild socialist reforms very similar to modern social democrats, entirely ignoring "minor details" like that the SA actively beat up people on the streets and spread terror wherever they showed up, that the nazis attempted a Coup d'Etat, and that socialists and communists later went to prison and concentration camps for their political views. Not to speak of killing 5-6 million Jews and being responsible for the death of about 25 million soldiers and 55 million civilians in WW2... The largest cognitive dissonance is with those people who suggest that jihadist propaganda should be interrupted but Nazi propaganda should be allowed to thrive unconditionally. That sounds very crazy to anyone who knows a little bit about history and can compare orders of magnitudes.

matttproud 9y ago

This has already has a name, and the eminent Karl Popper describes its precepts better than I: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance.

z0r 9y ago

An atmosphere of free speech that allows for satire and conversation are the best weapons against extremist ideology.