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Most western societies have some core values that, although often under pressure, most people generally subscribe to. Eg freedom of speech, bothsidesism, etc.
by skrebbel 6y ago
Most western societies have some core values that, although often under pressure, most people generally subscribe to. Eg freedom of speech, bothsidesism, etc.
I wish we could add one to the list: if you commit violent acts, we will ignore what you said, no matter how much or how little sense it makes.
Like, there's millions of weird extreme right manifestos out there, but the one by Anders Breivik is the only recent one that got attention because he killed an island full of young politicians. This bothers the shit out of me. How can media that pretend to hold high journalistic values do this?
Same of Kaczinsky. The moment he started blowing up buildings, he lost the right to be part of the debate in my opinion.
This is basically the media version of "we don't negotiate with terrorists / kidnappers / hostage takers / etc". In each individual case, it usually does make sense to negotiate. The reason states and organizations often take the position to not negotiate by policy, is because it encourages more terrorism, kidnappings and hostage situations.
As it stands, we're actively encouraging the use of violence to amplify an argument, and this blog post takes part in that. I have no doubts about the authors good intentions, but I'm flagging it nevertheless.
- pjc50 6y ago> if you commit violent acts, we will ignore what you said Does that also apply to the police and military?
- skrebbel 6y agoEh? Are you implying that violent police offers are violent because they want people to read their "manifesto"? And, in fact, yes. I think that if police officers or military wings blow stuff / people up, just to make a point, then we should ignore that point. But I don't think that's why they do it.
- voxl 6y agoI agree with your sentiment but you're arguing to the wrong audience. This is the same place that, despite any real evidence, has a user base that aggressively defended the usage of hydroxychloroquine. Perhaps it's a simple matter of Trump Cultism being able to infect any audience, but more likely I would bet it's an insidious anti-science. When you think so highly of yourself (as many HN posters do) as to ignore the recommendations of experts and insist that your pet theory is correct, you are also much more likely to entertain someone like the Unabomber. To even identify with him.
- skrebbel 6y agoI think you're making the mistake of assuming that HN has a singular opinion. Of course in a thread about hydroxychloroquine, you'll find lots of people with a strong (in this case, positive) opinion on hydroxychloroquine. That's not representative of the entire HN crowd at all. People who are like "meh, I don't know" won't engage with that thread as much.
- Miner49er 6y agoDo you actually do this? You do realize that means you need to ignore the police, military, and virtually every politician? Especially every person who has been president.
- zozbot234 6y agoPerhaps we should be doing more to ignore incumbent politicians and those with decision-making authority in the police/military, as a matter of basic freedom. If these folks care to advocate for their preferred policies, they can do so in a context where they're not actively participating in state-led violence.
- dangerface 6y agoYes of course, all these people you mentioned work for me they follow my orders not the other way around, why would I give a flying fuck what a politician though? I don't care what the military of France has to say if they start shit, my countrys military will end it and me, my country and our military won't give a flying fuck what the France military or policy or politician has to say. I get a lot of people just want a big strong benevolent [police, military, politician, president, terrorist] to rule and make them feel safe but power pisses on the weak.