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> If someone spray painted a swastika on your house, how would you react? Where I live (Görlitzer Park), those kinds of signs are literally everywhere -- only

> If someone spray painted a swastika on your house, how would you react? Where I live (Görlitzer Park), those kinds of signs are literally everywhere -- only they're the leftwing equivalent, calling for bloody revolution, for the rich to be booted from their homes, racists and xenophobes to be punched, etc. I'm actually pretty relaxed about it -- a bunch of 20 year olds who get their kicks spray painting while drinking copious amounts of booze? Big deal. And to offer another perspective on the recent emotional concern expressed so histrioniocally by a, politically speaking, suspiciously homogeneous crowd: Last year there was a huge, state financed charity billboard celebrating the life of... Fidel Castro. It was a collab between our Green local govt and the Cuban tourist ministry IIRC. Castro... who was responsible for how many deaths, 50,000? 100K? By way of comparison, Pinochet had (according to Wikipedia) 10-30K on his account. I guarantee you there were no billboards of him around. Do I need to mention the recent merry festivities surrounding Karl Marx 200th birthday -- ceremony lead by Jean-Claude Juncker? Lest I have my words twisted against: I don't desire either of the these men to be displayed on taxpayer financed billboards! The point that I'm trying to make is that this kind of legislation, and the so-called journalism and commentary surrounding it, don't fool anyone who's even the slightest bit (like me) conservative. We see right through these tendentiously applied, faux histrionic ("oh pity the poor soul who has endure watching -- and then deleting -- horribly vicious, hate-filled posts") outbursts whose real purpose is totally obvious. Namely to leverage dominance in various domains (journalism, charity, education, civil service) to usurp the electoral beating the left taken in any number of countries over the past two years. A beating meted out by a population who sees through the phony social concern, and sees the manifest and seething hypocrisy, the coziness of those who are insanely rich and the charity, journalistic, and civil service complexes. In this battle any means to push back against at the barbarians at the gate are deemed appropriate. And so we are treated to the pathetic spectacle of those screeching about the deleterious, democracy damaging impact of fake news happily engaging in its production if it suits their side, the so-called defenders of liberty and free speech engaging in a rampage of censorship, bullying, "calling out", etc. of anyone who has an even slightly different opinion. Now, don't get me wrong, I understand that those forces have no intention of trying to convince me. That is definitely not the goal, for if it were, the path that's being taken would certainly be recognized as wholly counterproductive. No, the real goal is to set boundaries, to wear out, tire, and demoralize the enemy. In other words, this is a propaganda war, exactly as e.g. Jacques Ellul described it. The very focus on such emotively charged terms as "love" (what we're about) and "hate speech" (what they do) makes this patently obvious. To finalize, my feeling is that the forces I've described are winning, and I actually think they'll prevail in the battle. The propaganda war won't make any friends, but I believe it will succeed in its purpose, which is to wear out and dissipate the forces currently arrayed against it. Final note: this is just an opinion. It's a strong one, yes. But I really love being proven wrong, so I'm really happy for the many highly intelligent and well-informed HNers to tear my argument apart. Have fun :)

eksemplar 8y ago
I view it a lot less like a battle between the establishment and the barbarians at the gate, and much more a struggle to take away the megaphone from the village idiot. We’ve always had people who called vaccines dangerous against better evidence, but platforms like facebook, allowed these people to construct their own realities, and as a result people are now dying from diseases that have been extinct for more than 50 years. As I’ve said, there have always been village idiots, but social media marks the first time in human history, that we’ve actually had to take them seriously.
- seertaak 8y ago
  This comment is rather amusing -- probably unwittingly so -- when juxtaposed with (your) preceding post. In one, you ask us to empathize with the feelings of one group of people, those who are flustered by seeing (horrible) extremist propaganda. In the very next, not only are those finely-tuned emotional antennae manifestly off, but... well, suggesting a rather large cohort of people are mentally disabled? This from the person that wishes to portray themselves as the adult who needs "take their megaphones", which I understand as code for "let's have any comments they make on FB or other social networks erased". A little childish, perhaps? What do I make of these two comments? How I read them is as follows: you're so utterly sure of your position -- because you're likely inclined to believe it, and because you've been bombarded with messages confirming it ("the others are stupid") -- that you're quite literally failing to engage your brain. Instead, you're making lazy, emotive arguments. So thanks for proving my point: the claims that one should consider so-and-so's feelings, the supposed humanism. That's just BS, isn't it?
  - eksemplar 8y ago
    What on earth gave you the impression that I was some sort of liberal lighthouse? On parts of Facebook the value of a professor in medicine counts for less than the experiences of an average soccer mom, and you’re seriously telling me to accept that as a new norm because it might hurt someone’s feelings if I didn’t? Right.
vanderreeah 8y ago

eksemplar 8y ago

I view it a lot less like a battle between the establishment and the barbarians at the gate, and much more a struggle to take away the megaphone from the village idiot. We’ve always had people who called vaccines dangerous against better evidence, but platforms like facebook, allowed these people to construct their own realities, and as a result people are now dying from diseases that have been extinct for more than 50 years. As I’ve said, there have always been village idiots, but social media marks the first time in human history, that we’ve actually had to take them seriously.

seertaak 8y ago
This comment is rather amusing -- probably unwittingly so -- when juxtaposed with (your) preceding post. In one, you ask us to empathize with the feelings of one group of people, those who are flustered by seeing (horrible) extremist propaganda. In the very next, not only are those finely-tuned emotional antennae manifestly off, but... well, suggesting a rather large cohort of people are mentally disabled? This from the person that wishes to portray themselves as the adult who needs "take their megaphones", which I understand as code for "let's have any comments they make on FB or other social networks erased". A little childish, perhaps? What do I make of these two comments? How I read them is as follows: you're so utterly sure of your position -- because you're likely inclined to believe it, and because you've been bombarded with messages confirming it ("the others are stupid") -- that you're quite literally failing to engage your brain. Instead, you're making lazy, emotive arguments. So thanks for proving my point: the claims that one should consider so-and-so's feelings, the supposed humanism. That's just BS, isn't it?
- eksemplar 8y ago
  What on earth gave you the impression that I was some sort of liberal lighthouse? On parts of Facebook the value of a professor in medicine counts for less than the experiences of an average soccer mom, and you’re seriously telling me to accept that as a new norm because it might hurt someone’s feelings if I didn’t? Right.

vanderreeah 8y ago