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> the war ended and people moved on The Vietnam-era "culture war" did not, however. It continued for quite some time. Just like the Civil Rights era and McCart

> the war ended and people moved on The Vietnam-era "culture war" did not, however. It continued for quite some time. Just like the Civil Rights era and McCarthyism beore it, both of which came with their share of lynch mobs, and sometimes literal rather than metaphorical ones. >That in my view is what’s new and worse about it and it’s only likely to get more integrated with us. Absolutely we should work to reduce this kind of behavior, but it is in no way something "new". Dragging people on Twitter is a significant improvement from dragging them in front of Congress on national TV, which is an improvement from dragging them... behind cars.

free_rms 6y ago
The underlying witch-hunt mentality has obviously existed since before the term witch-hunt. The new part is that social media arguably accelerates it. One wacko trying to burn the witches in a village full of level heads couldn't accomplish anything. Now they can band together nationally.
- genericone 6y ago
  The Red Guards accomplished the national banding together thing, with the approval of the establishment, going from village to village, city to city, they burned and hanged witches, and destroyed problematic symbols too.
  - free_rms 6y ago
    They were actually incredibly fractured and fought each other a lot, actual fights with weapons and casualties. But still, you're right, they only got off the ground initially due to a national infrastructure encouraging them. Social Media is more of an accidental paper-clip-optimizer national encouragement.
CRConrad 6y ago
> > [bamboozled] the war ended and people moved on > [dralley] The Vietnam-era "culture war" did not, however. It continued for quite some time. Evidence (anecdotal) in support: Jane Fonda is STILL referred to as “Hanoi Jane”; I think I've seen it used even more recently than, e.g, [1]. This is from 1972, i.e. almost fifty years ago. OK, half that time the Internet has been available, and half of that in turn, “social media”. But for the first ~twenty-five years of that, they weren't. [1]: https://time.com/5116479/jane-fonda-hanoi-jane-nickname/ https://time.com/5116479/jane-fonda-hanoi-jane-nickname/

free_rms 6y ago

The underlying witch-hunt mentality has obviously existed since before the term witch-hunt. The new part is that social media arguably accelerates it. One wacko trying to burn the witches in a village full of level heads couldn't accomplish anything. Now they can band together nationally.

genericone 6y ago
The Red Guards accomplished the national banding together thing, with the approval of the establishment, going from village to village, city to city, they burned and hanged witches, and destroyed problematic symbols too.
- free_rms 6y ago
  They were actually incredibly fractured and fought each other a lot, actual fights with weapons and casualties. But still, you're right, they only got off the ground initially due to a national infrastructure encouraging them. Social Media is more of an accidental paper-clip-optimizer national encouragement.

CRConrad 6y ago

> > [bamboozled] the war ended and people moved on > [dralley] The Vietnam-era "culture war" did not, however. It continued for quite some time. Evidence (anecdotal) in support: Jane Fonda is STILL referred to as “Hanoi Jane”; I think I've seen it used even more recently than, e.g, [1]. This is from 1972, i.e. almost fifty years ago. OK, half that time the Internet has been available, and half of that in turn, “social media”. But for the first ~twenty-five years of that, they weren't. [1]: https://time.com/5116479/jane-fonda-hanoi-jane-nickname/ https://time.com/5116479/jane-fonda-hanoi-jane-nickname/