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Yes, we let literal Nazis March in Skokie. Tolerance except for those one thinks are immoral beyond reason is gives just as much license for, say, an anti-abort

Yes, we let literal Nazis March in Skokie. Tolerance except for those one thinks are immoral beyond reason is gives just as much license for, say, an anti-abortion activists who genuinely sees abortion as murder to remove people who support abortion.

dragontamer 7y ago
Indeed. And that is the conundrum, is it not? We absolutely cannot let evil stand when we identify evil. Otherwise, it marches in and kills many. On the other hand, if we misidentify evil, then innocent people die. I'm not saying I have a solution. But the idea that "tolerance will save us all" is hopelessly naive. The sad fact is, a large number of people are systematically intolerant.
- manfredo 7y ago
  > We absolutely cannot let evil stand when we identify evil. Otherwise, it marches in and kills many. No, you let evil speech stand. And you call it out as evil, and make clear reasoned arguments why it is evil. That is the solution. Only when that evil speech turns into action does the society step in. Resorting to censorship only demonstrates weakness and an inability or unwillingness to argue against evil. This leads to people questioning whether the target of censorship really is evil at all.
  - dragontamer 7y ago
    > No, you let evil speech stand. And you call it out as evil, and make clear reasoned arguments why it is evil. That is the solution. That doesn't work. If you really think you can "convince" people to tolerate others, feel free to go to Stormfront and convince the white-nationalists to stop being racist. Go and try it. Its not like these hateful locations are unknown, its a free and open internet. Go an talk with them for a week. You might learn how easy it is to rationalize bigotry and racism. At some point, you gotta just shut it down, like what the world did to 8chan. And these situations aren't hypothetical at all. You literally can go test your theory at Stormfront. > Only when that evil speech turns into action does the society step in. We're too late for that. Christchurch shooter, and then El Paso shooter. We've got a strain of intolerant speech that are inspiring lone-wolves to go into literal suicide missions to shoot people they don't like right now. Gun control debate is locked. Its been like 2 weeks and everyone's already forgotten about the El Paso shooter. Nothing will come about with that. But at least we shut down 8chan, one of the hangout spots for this hateful branch of people. We should probably shutdown other hangout spots too, like Stormfront.
    - manfredo 7y ago
      No, quite the opposite. Shutting it down often makes things worse. Deplatforming (both in the social sense and in the technological sense) gained traction around 2013 and 2014. Do you think that bigotry and racism as reduced since then? The daily stormer was kicked off cloudflare in 2017. Do you see a reduction in hate and bigotry? No, if anything we have seen an increase. You can't change people's minds by ostracizing them. Shutting down speech, especially the speech you think is immoral, makes the problem worse. And to your point, yes people have changed the minds of white nationalists by engaging with them. It's hard but it can happen. By comparison, how many white nationalists do you think had their minds changed by having their speech censored? Usually this only reinforces the belief in a {Jewish | Globalist | immigrant | etc. } conspiracy against whites. If people think big tech is run by George Soros and is censoring conservatives and is working to the detriment of whites, then getting kicked off th internet is pretty much directly reinforcing their conspiracy.
      - dragontamer 7y ago
        We can look at Germany as the best example of how to do this correctly. In Germany, it is literally illegal to portray Nazi imagery. They did their best to fully "kill" the Nazi movement after their loss in WW2. Shutting things down works. The (modern) US just doesn't want to go that way. In fact, shutting things down and erasing history is perhaps one of the most effective methodologies from a historical point of view. But historically, the US had an office of censorship for a reason during WW2, so that public opinion could be unified against Nazi-ism. People often ask why WW2 was so effective at unifying the country. Well... yeah. Office of Censorship and clamping down on speech, and systemic advertisements + propaganda funded by US Government and pushed by Walt Disney. It just needs to be done from the top down. You can't expect the free market to do it on its own. > By comparison, how many white nationalists do you think had their minds changed by having their speech censored? Usually this only reinforces the belief in a {Jewish | Globalist | immigrant | etc. } conspiracy against whites. The idea is not to change their minds. The idea is to prevent them from talking, and changing the minds of others.
        7y ago

dragontamer 7y ago

Indeed. And that is the conundrum, is it not? We absolutely cannot let evil stand when we identify evil. Otherwise, it marches in and kills many. On the other hand, if we misidentify evil, then innocent people die. I'm not saying I have a solution. But the idea that "tolerance will save us all" is hopelessly naive. The sad fact is, a large number of people are systematically intolerant.

manfredo 7y ago
> We absolutely cannot let evil stand when we identify evil. Otherwise, it marches in and kills many. No, you let evil speech stand. And you call it out as evil, and make clear reasoned arguments why it is evil. That is the solution. Only when that evil speech turns into action does the society step in. Resorting to censorship only demonstrates weakness and an inability or unwillingness to argue against evil. This leads to people questioning whether the target of censorship really is evil at all.
- dragontamer 7y ago
  > No, you let evil speech stand. And you call it out as evil, and make clear reasoned arguments why it is evil. That is the solution. That doesn't work. If you really think you can "convince" people to tolerate others, feel free to go to Stormfront and convince the white-nationalists to stop being racist. Go and try it. Its not like these hateful locations are unknown, its a free and open internet. Go an talk with them for a week. You might learn how easy it is to rationalize bigotry and racism. At some point, you gotta just shut it down, like what the world did to 8chan. And these situations aren't hypothetical at all. You literally can go test your theory at Stormfront. > Only when that evil speech turns into action does the society step in. We're too late for that. Christchurch shooter, and then El Paso shooter. We've got a strain of intolerant speech that are inspiring lone-wolves to go into literal suicide missions to shoot people they don't like right now. Gun control debate is locked. Its been like 2 weeks and everyone's already forgotten about the El Paso shooter. Nothing will come about with that. But at least we shut down 8chan, one of the hangout spots for this hateful branch of people. We should probably shutdown other hangout spots too, like Stormfront.
  - manfredo 7y ago
    No, quite the opposite. Shutting it down often makes things worse. Deplatforming (both in the social sense and in the technological sense) gained traction around 2013 and 2014. Do you think that bigotry and racism as reduced since then? The daily stormer was kicked off cloudflare in 2017. Do you see a reduction in hate and bigotry? No, if anything we have seen an increase. You can't change people's minds by ostracizing them. Shutting down speech, especially the speech you think is immoral, makes the problem worse. And to your point, yes people have changed the minds of white nationalists by engaging with them. It's hard but it can happen. By comparison, how many white nationalists do you think had their minds changed by having their speech censored? Usually this only reinforces the belief in a {Jewish | Globalist | immigrant | etc. } conspiracy against whites. If people think big tech is run by George Soros and is censoring conservatives and is working to the detriment of whites, then getting kicked off th internet is pretty much directly reinforcing their conspiracy.
    - dragontamer 7y ago
      We can look at Germany as the best example of how to do this correctly. In Germany, it is literally illegal to portray Nazi imagery. They did their best to fully "kill" the Nazi movement after their loss in WW2. Shutting things down works. The (modern) US just doesn't want to go that way. In fact, shutting things down and erasing history is perhaps one of the most effective methodologies from a historical point of view. But historically, the US had an office of censorship for a reason during WW2, so that public opinion could be unified against Nazi-ism. People often ask why WW2 was so effective at unifying the country. Well... yeah. Office of Censorship and clamping down on speech, and systemic advertisements + propaganda funded by US Government and pushed by Walt Disney. It just needs to be done from the top down. You can't expect the free market to do it on its own. > By comparison, how many white nationalists do you think had their minds changed by having their speech censored? Usually this only reinforces the belief in a {Jewish | Globalist | immigrant | etc. } conspiracy against whites. The idea is not to change their minds. The idea is to prevent them from talking, and changing the minds of others.
      - 7y ago